I don't either. It's like thinking that if you had a beat up, 69 Camaro that you were lucky enough to buy for 1500 bucks and you thought hell, there is no way I'm going to spend five or $10,000 restoring it, because then it is still just a $1,500 car. That's certainly not the case. And it is not the case with this preamp either. You generally never get the money back out of something that you spend upgrading, modifying, or restoring it. But the value increase in a building modded C1 versus a stock one is a pretty substantial jump.
I sold my first BillD C-1that was completely redone by B-Man for $700 and i wish it had never done that.