[Signman]

It all depends on what you know, who you know and how soon you want to go racing.

If you don't know a lot about building drag cars........... buy a car.
If you don't have friends who are racing stock and are willing to advise you and point you in the right direction........ buy a car.
If you want to get out on the track quickly....... buy a car.

Just brought out my J/SA 4 year project. Here's my take:
Decided on a chassis and combo, looked around at what was out there and realized that anything competitive would cost 20K plus at least. The chassis would probably not have the work in it that I wanted. Most of these are street cars with parts bolted on. The car would most likely not be fresh or sold with the best parts the owner had for it. More than likely would end up taking it apart, doing all the work and purchase new parts or freshened parts, easily spending another 15K.
Now we have 35K in the car. that may only be worth 25K.

Got lucky and stumbled on to a rust free street driven south western chassis. Tore it down and assembled the car the way I wanted using all the good advise available to me building and buying correctly the first time. Did as much of the work as possible my self. Made deals, bought some used and paid full price for good parts. Spent under 30K for a competitive car that I'm proud of and happy with. The cost was spread out over 4 years which made it less painful. No loans or credit card balances to pay off.
Rest assured that if you cannot do the majority of the dirty work, building a competitive stocker will set you back 50K PLUS. The man hours are incredible. Good parts are expensive.

We are not talking about an A, B, or C car. How fast do you want to go?