Are the days of completely rotten series for a few hundred quid gone?
Yes unfortunately these days are completely gone. You will be lucky to get a parts car for less than £1000 these days. One that is capable of running and driving is then significantly more and one that is road worthy more again. They are no longer cheap and unfortunately parts are getting more expensive as well (although still cheaper than most cars)
a lot of people start with "I'll do a rolling resto a bit every now and then" till they hit problems and give up and sell as a project
I would agree with the above but I would also still insist that a rolling restoration is the way to go. If you get your first one and immediately strip it to bits the the chance of finishing is slim. There is an endless supply of failed projects where they have been disassembled but not put back together. A rolling restoration means it is always reassembled and you can drive it in between parts needing repair to see if it does what you were hoping and you can put up with it. I ran into some very large problems with both of mine but I am far to stubborn to not continue, mainly because everyone else was telling me I should get rid of it and get sensible car.
Deffo not bothered about the paint, its a land rover!
Paint does not need to be expensive. I have painted both of mine with foam gloss rollers and traditional enamel paint. as long as you put some time in to sand a degrease you can get a good enough finish for a land rover. It is not a modern 2pack spray finish but it is certainly a decent paint job if you do it correctly and you will find as you replace things with either new or second hand (doors being the biggest one) that it looses its nice patina and just looks odd.
These are the main areas but if you are looking at a 109 station wagon then you need to look at the door frames as the rear angled doors are not cheap and easy to replace. Simialrly the sills and b/c pillars as they re also steel that will rust. If you are looking at a hard top then these become less of an issue.Rust spots, is it just chassis, bulkhead, and footwells? Thats it right?