This is one of those projects that you need to sit down and think if you were going to build your EB from scratch what would you like to put on it. DO NOT get all worked up about neat parts if you wouldn't buy them for yourself. DO NOT pay for parts you don't want thinking you can sell them later and recoup cost. I bought a basket case that was a pile of parts for $1100 and sold everything I didn't want for more than I paid for it and still had a registered drivable bronco. But I was lucky.
For instance I hate polished billet steering columns. Not that the Colum isn't nice and worth money but I would have to paint it to be happy with it and there are far cheaper ways to get a painted tilt column.
The body problems could be an easy fix in a weekend or 100s of hours.
My experience with selling parts is best described as unpredictable. I have an NP435 and adapter for sale for the cost of the adapter. I have been trying to sell the three hole billet pulley and harmonic balancer for the 302 for half retail for a year now. But on the other hand I got almost full retail on ebay for the limited slip differentials that were in the bronco when I bought it. I could go on for hours about how some things bring full retail and others don't sell. I had a lunch box locker for the 44 for sale for a starting price of $100. It went through three 7 day auctions without selling. Then I lowered the price to $75 and it sold for $150 to the same guy that had been asking me questions about it for three weeks.
All that is to say if you would have bought the parts for themselves give him less than a quarter of vendor cost if you know you are going to sell them.
If I was seriously looking at this bronco I would make him show me it would run. Nothing drives the cost down more than a guy spending an hour or so trying to show you it will run. I would also assume that carb has been sitting open like that for 14 years and that if it ever did run he was running it without an air cleaner.
the mismatching frame is more of problem dependent upon where you live. Here in Dallas TX getting a lost title can be almost impossible but if you have a paper title in hand registration is a snap. You don't even have to take vehicle in when you transfer title. Some states like Maine and Alabama are bill of sale states with vehicle this old and there are services that will get you a title if you live someplace like I do. Heck I can go out to east TX to the county where my dad lives and walk in and say we lost this title it has been sitting behind the barn for years and poof you will get a title.
Again, if you were going to build your bronco with an unlimited budget how much of this would you use? Establish what it is worth to you with your final build in mind and then if that's not enough to get it from him figure 25% or less retail on the things you will sell and shoot that price at him.
Unfortunately those bad hanging doors and tailgate may be an indication of how well the engine was build or how ell other things were done.
Good luck. I do agree with pit bull do the least you have to do and enjoy it if you get it.
