The chop shop is great, but right now there is some problems that I think need addressing for the chop shop to actually be worth it.
The first problem involves people abusing the wait mechanic and then mugging you. Until this problem is addressed it's essentially pointless to chop shop while there are other criminals there, because some people simply pretend they're chopping a car and then when you finish instantly get out and mug you. This doesn't seem very role play friendly to me, as in real life I would know whether somebody was chopping a car or not and in real life criminals wouldn't bring heat to the area in which they chop cars.
I think this could be solved by either making it so you don't have to wait 7 minutes, but instead it chops instantly or simply make the area around the chop shop (ironically) a no crime zone. This would make the chop shop good place for fellow criminals to meet and chat, rather than just abuse the wait mechanic and mug on sight.
The second problem is people coming to retrieve their cars from the chop shop. So, you steal a car, get it to the chop shop and getting there + the time it takes to chop gives the victim enough time to get to you to get their car back. Again, I don't think this is very role play friendly, would you go get your car from a chop shop full of criminals in real life? Don't think so and it also doesn't make sense that I'm half way through chopping and then the victim can still drive off in the car when they get it back, that car in real life would be half in bits. I do not think people who have had their cars stolen should be allowed to retrieve their car from the area surrounding the chop shop unless both parties (the thief and the victim) are aware they're in a role play pursuit scenario before they reach the zone.
Thirdly, the economy of the chop shop needs better balance. Perhaps give each category of vehicle a base price and then modify that price by how much modifications the car has and the quality of the modifications, I dunno, but buying a bobby pin for $350 and then chopping a car and only getting $500 is definitely not worth it, especially if the bobby pin fails, you can end up losing money on bobby pin costs if more than one breaks. There is also little incentive to chop cars for any kind of criminal living, as you first have to actually find a car which can take a while and what you find might not actually be even close to what you could make just working as a trucker or courier. I can appreciate how difficult this is though, as you do not want to make it so lucrative that suddenly everybody is just stealing cars.
