Blown head gasket repair? 96 deville

Hi I just bought a 96 deville with 85,000 miles these seem to be the original miles I have a carfax report with all the details and it all checks out.

I bought the car for $1,000 its white diamond pearl and the paint and interior is excellent. I don't regret the purchase at all.

My problem is I bought this car knowing that the Head gasket was blown or leaking.

I am familar with cars but have not yet dealed with this problem on a car before.

First off what is the average price I can expect at a shop?

what's the average time and cost of parts involved?

what is the know how needed to fix this problem?

Are any special tools required?

I might just buy a junkyard motor for under a 1000 if it is my best choice and just swap the motor but if it's better to repair then I will.

Let me know what you guys think.

Thanks

Is this a Northstar motor? 4.9?

If it's a 4.6 Northstar this is a tricky repair. The engine is made of aluminum (spelling) so setting to torque when re-installing the head is tricky. These heads aren't torqued by pound feet, it's done with a degree gauge when every bolt it turned 70 degrees at a time. Must of the head gaskets we did at my shop resulted in ruined threads in the block. So if a thread pulls out when removing or re-inatalling the head then you must drill and heli-coil all the head bolt and there's no guarantee the coils won't pull out. Try looking for a used engine and beware of the northstars that need a reseal of the bottom end. Most of them leak.