he's right, it does depend on where you live, but it depends more on the shop itself. Ask the shop to see some of their work. Are they proud to show you what they've done? When it comes to paint, a good, quality shop makes all the difference in the world. I have over $10K in my body work and current paintjob, and before that I had a different custom paint job that cost around $2500 (it's wasn't a full color change, just repainted stock pearl white w/ some graphics) (not at a maaco, either) The quality wasn't quite there, and it kept bugging me, so I decided to go all out. So I'm telling you, if you spend 2 grand now, you'll regret it later and end up spending much more to correct the problem.
Just my 2cents...