Your venture capital is already in your possession: Put those buses up for sale on The Samba! Especially if you still have the '54! haha!
Seriously though; I'm sure you know that old VW 'splitty' buses are going for a king's ransom these days. Good quality rebuild parts are getting harder and harder to come by each day. The only reason guys like Ronnie in Lake Havasu are able to sell those green replacement sheetmetal panels, is because their value has risen so much, it almost makes financial sense to restore one. Interesting, and way up there on the 'cool-scale' but I'm afraid rebuilding VW buses is not a very good foundation for a profit oriented business plan. Take that with a grain of salt, it's just one man's opinion.
Having played with VW's for 30years, having driven the famous All pre-'68 Bus Shasta Snow Trip 3 times, have driven over 100mph in a '65 VW bus several times, I have some input...
I'm not sure you will get the torque you want in a bus, using John Karcey's FE bug engine recipe. You read hotVW's, I highly endorse the engine showcased in the recent Wolfgang (my friend Steve Phillips) 2liter engine build series. I have put a few thousand miles on one of Steve's 2liters, with a regeared trans it's a great combination. On the downside, it's no FE machine. The high mileage motor might work ok, but you won't like that engine with tall gears in a splitty bus.
Aerodynamics: A few years ago, before taking my friend's '65 Bus on the
Beetle Ball 24 (bootleg, under the radar, vw race from Vancouver, BC to Ensenada, Mexico) I did a few things to make improvements, not so much for FE, but to make the engine not work so hard at higher freeway speeds in the heat of July. I built a front airdam, using 1/8" thick polyethylene plastic and conduit underframe, wrapped around the front, attached just under the lower pinch weld. I removed the front bumber, as well. I also added plastic side skirts, and salt flat wheel covers (there was a small picture of the bus, both Greg and I in hotVW's after winning the 2010 Beetle Ball Rally series championship). Unfortunately, I never was able to get any meaningful FE or A-B-A aero test data, I just ran out of time and energy. I will say the bus handled so much better, very noticable around semi-trucks, and was incredibly quieter than before.
Fortunately, those same parts, the airdam, side skirts, wheel covers are going onto a second VW bus being raced at Bonneville WOS in 10 days! Jason Lang is trying to become the first guy to get a split window Bus over 100mph during competition on the salt. After that feat is in the bag, he will try to put it into the 130mph club! I will try to convince Jason to do some comparisons, top speeds with and without airdam and side skirts.
I'll stop rambling now...
Today
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The next owner had it under a tarp in his back yard for 10 years. Last I heard it resold for $14K. But your right, I might sell on the wheels, then the motor, then the van to finance the eRat (in my Profile pic).
The full business plan would be partnering with a local electric conversion shop for 3 conversions, with an option for 2 more. The rest would be Vanagons (since it is a 'standard' conversion), and the van would become Old Number 1, and used only for back-up for the others when the drivers run down their batteries.
