Body and paint is very subjective, and each person has a different perspective on what is considered driver grade body & paint, and what is considered show quality. The biggest problem is that 60%-70% of owners will walk in saying they want driver grade work and a reasonable price (say 10K to 15K budget) and that later escalates as they come in to check progress and start adding this or asking for that. Of course the bodywork can escalate quickly where an initial quote may call for 15K as a repaint with lets say 80 hours to bodywork and prep, but then some previous repairs or rust issues are found and the owner wants it fixed properly which can add another 40+ hours to a project before the blink of an eye. That involves costs of another $3000 give or take and then the owner shows up asking for House of Kolor paint with a metallic silver finish and a 3 stage cut and polish. Yup...just added another grand or two in materials and another 60-80 hours to prep the body to properly block it out before the paint is laid on. Add to that another 20-30 hours for a high end cut and polish and that 15K job just rose to 25K-28K
My last HOK painted car had nearly 400 hours in the body & paint work and was virtually rust free to begin with. A few small rust issues and older repairs were found once we dove in. Those required about 40 hours of proper repairs before moving on. I then decided I wanted the firewall smoothed (add 20 hours), and the engine bay finished in gloss black (another 20 hours) and the list went on. The total project included 4 stage paint and final finishing with a 3 level cut and a full 3 stage polish. Over 2000 sheets of sand paper were used on the wet sand finish and those kinds of materials do add to the final costs. FWIW sanding alone required tens of thousands of cross hatch sanding strokes to be made before the paint and clear were ready for final polishing. What i'm saying here is that it takes a lot of time for proper show quality paint. I was given a break on the price as I have done a few cars in this small private shop but it still cost north of 25K for that one. The final finish was an award winning paint job, but I didn't go into this project with anything more than a good driver quality job in mind. In comparison, any of the upper end shops in this area that can deliver this quality wouldn't have touched that car for less than 50K at this level of finish. (The above rates are Canadian are not typical in most high end shops. In some cases you can expect to pay double for this kind of paint. In USD it may be less per hour but the outcome will likely be similar as hours do costs money)
A few pictures of that paint job for those who want to see the car I am referring to.
House of Kolor Orion Silver (Custom tinted with 5% black and metallic fillers added)
As with any black car, the body prep must be perfect and takes hundreds of hours.
A shot of the black taken at Goodguys Colorado to show the depth in this paint job.