Buying a SMB... Please Help!

[TucknRoll]

Hi Everyone,

I am new to the forum and this is my first post so hopefully I'm in the right place and thanks in advance for the help.

A quick background, my wife fell in love with the idea of owning a Sportsmobile a couple years ago and begged to swap our 2500 for one. I loved the idea, but we had a few other projects that took up our time/money at the time so I said we could once our truck died.... fast forward to last week when the transmission on our truck went out and the SMB was back on the table.

Over the last year we have casually browsed photos getting an idea for features/designs we liked, but this week we went into overdrive and looked at every craigslist, autotrader, ebay, etc. listing we could find. After falling in and out of love a dozen times I was hoping you could help us with a few questions/concerns.

We found a rig for sale that we like and it seems like a good deal, but there are a few aspects that aren't our ideal setup. Our concern is that it may take a really long time for our ideal van to show up for sale (months? years?), in which case we should act on the good deal and roll up our sleeves to modify it to where we want it to be. Below are a few questions. Any insight you can provide would be helpful.

QUESTIONS (aspects to address on the van we are considering):

Exterior Color - How much would it cost to get a E350 EB repainted?
Interior Color - Is it possible (cost?) to change the interior panels (dash, doors, etc.) from tan to blacks/greys?
Grill/Lights/Hood - Is it possible (cost?) to convert the older models to the newer (+2008) design (looks more modern)
Layout - Is there a benefit to the forward facing bench as opposed to the side facing bench?
Availability - How often do SMBs come up for sale with extended body, <125k miles, 6.0L diesels (the 7.3L is so loud), 2008-2010 (we like the lights/grill/hood), <$80k, 4x4, pop-top (no idea if that's the right lingo)?

Thanks again for all of the help and we can't wait to be part of the cool kid club!!