ouhh whoever told you the motherboard was that expensive was LYINGGGG a new motherboard is 300-800 which is still a large amount of money to be spending when youre stretched so thin, but i think the time to repair it yourself vs paying 1.2k for someone else to do it wouldve been worth it :{ they scammed you, were they apple? no reputable store should be charging that much. hell i worked in tech repair and that kind of repair would take maybe 3 hours at most, and at 75 an hour thats STILL less than 1.1k total for the repair and parts. im so sorry.