Need Opinions On Engine Work

[ZephyrEFI]

Alright, so I need some opinions. I've been wanting to get my shortblock rebuilt, right? It's about the only part of the car I haven't replaced or heavily overhauled. It's got high miles, leaks up the wazoo, and has been known to scare me with things like milky looking oil, white smoke, brown coolant after only a short time, etc. And it just doesn't seem all that healthy to me. The inner workings of an engine are not all that foreign to me, but I've never actually DONE one myself, and I don't really trust myself not to do something wrong. I want this car good to go, long term, in near daily driver duty.

Anyway, I called a local engine shop to get an idea of what it would cost me to have this done at a shop. This means, I drive it there, they do their thing, test everything out, I drive it home. This appeals to me for a number of reasons. 1) obviously it's the least amount of work for me. 2) it gives someone besides me some measure of responsibility with how things are put together, and gives me the opportunity to have someone else look over what all I've done and make sure I haven't screwed something important up. 4) Someone who really knows what he/she is doing would install and degree my new cam. 5) They would install more performance oriented parts in the bottom end that I wouldn't get with a reman shortblock.

They got back to me with a ballpark figure of $5000. That is about DOUBLE what I was expecting. It's not a final number, and I haven't actually brought the car to them for them to look at, but I have to assume, I'm looking at paying something very close to that from just about any place I have it done. Although, I do plan to get more quotes.

We do have the money, but I really don't know if i can justify paying that. I don't even really want to ask my wife if she'd be okay with me spending that much of the family's money (at least not all at once) on something that's pretty much just for ME. Obviously I know there are cheaper ways to go, such as buying a reman shortblock and slapping it in myself. I could pull my engine myself and bring it to the shop out of the car... and so on.

What would you guys do in my place?