I agree with this issue. My situation is that I have a '92 Seville in need of a few key parts, such as, a motor for the trunk, a headlamp assembly for the left side w/ a support mount and a hood.
Instead of taking it to the dealer and getting gouged to the third degree by dealers that don't care about the product, just their bottomline, I decided to do it myself.
I'm finding prices that are above the usual market price, and going to the dealer for them, forget it!
I recently got my hands on
a wheel hub assembly for a bargain at $127.00. All the other places around here, have them for that much before taxes. I have a headlamp assembly priced at 320.00 right now. The hood is going to run me about 500.00 or so. But if I had the dealer to do the work, they'd cost me about $2000.00, plus labor! The damage isn't even that bad for crying out loud!
For a '92, I should be able to get parts for it much cheaper than I'm having to pay for them right now and some of the stuff I end up buying, I don't even need.
All I got to say is, thank god for AC Delco.....