Howdy fellow Chicagoan. My first foray into home espresso was a Gaggia Classic and a Baratza Encore. That was more than enough to replace my forays into the coffee shops.

A friend of mine uses a cheap breville and preground coffee and is satisfied, so I think it all depends on how picky you are.

I started home espresso with a Breville Barista Express. That served me well for about 4 years before I got tired of its limitations, especially in regards to grind uniformity and making adjustments for different roasts (ie temp, pressure, etc.). I stopped using the built in grinder in favor of an Atom 60, which led to a massive improvement and held me over until upgrading to a Profitec Pro 600.

Until I want something plumbed in, or really want to geek out over data from a Decent, I don't see much reason to upgrade any time soon.

I use a Gaggia New Baby espresso machine that I bought for £60 here in the UK of Facebook marketplace. A £100 manual handgrinder (Kingrinder K4) and speciality beans from a local roastery. The espresso I can make at home tastes better than all but the best speciality shops where I live. Honestly, it's sort of spoiled me now, and it's rather disappointing when I go somehow I don't know and end up with a mediocre coffee!

Uniterra Nomad. Workflow is a little fussy but it works great. I've found that especially on lighter roasts, using lower pressures helps a lot.

Doesn't really answer your question, but I've been really happy making "faux latte"s and such with my Moka pot. A little inconvenient to clean, but definitely takes up less space than a mini espresso machine.

I use a Europiccola lever machine. I can get shots on par or better than all but the best coffee shops in my area (though the frother leaves something to be desired). I’m using a manual grinder, which is a good way to keep the budget down and keep quality high.

I use a moka pot. While it may not be "true" espresso, it's brewed via pressure and has a lovely strength.

I have a Decent DE1PRO at home but you don't need to do that, you can get great espresso with something like a Bambino Plus, a good hand grinder, and some accessories to improve consistency (like 0.1g accurate scales)

For a lot of people I think they'd be perfectly happy making espresso-like drinks with a Mokapot or an aeropress at home.

If you want a budget machine than can make great espresso, and your willing to learn a lever machine workflow, I'd highly recommend looking at the Flair lineup. They have amazing options at a few price points.

Beans, grinder, technique. Then machine.

I’ve had a number of machines (decent now) and it isn’t required to make something really good. Learn the basic techniques to get the flow and pressure right with your unit of choice. Dual boiler or switched boiler (either steam or brew via a switch) is my suggestion there, as the heat exchangers are great, but you have to play with them to know how it works.

Learn Wdt.