I would lean toward Nolan's #1, because we know that John won't buy the thing back AND none of the kit car magazines who have run glowing articles about JPS in the past will touch a "Fix the Green JPS Coupe" article and potentially make a past magazine celebrity and paying advertiser look bad, right?
So that leaves getting a shop local to Tom to specify the work needed, getting John to agree to the work needed and payment schedules and then getting it all done. BTW: I know for a fact that Henry at IM does this whenever it makes sense, and I suspect that Carey at Special Edition does so, too. Nothing new there.
Will this work in this case? That's yet to be seen, and there's a lot to be leary about in that deal.
I would still put my money on the fellow Speedster/Spyder owners on the Mid-Atlantic Coast to come through and "Git R Dun!" I've already estimated the potential parts cost to be well under the $800 Tom would be out just for the shipping, before anything gets done, PLUS he would be out of the car for at least two weeks (a week each way, plus however long John keeps it) and it's ALWAYS to make things happen when the car is 3000 miles away, right?
It would be cheaper IMHO, to keep the thing back East, get folks workin' on it and fix it incrementally over the Summer - and, of course, document what gets done, too.