As I've said here more than a few times, go looking for "estate sale" or
"post estate sale before we sell the house cleanout the heavy equipment
sale" Old, Big Lathes. The less the present owners feel like moving
them, the cheaper they are. If you need riggers to move them, just
factor that into the price. I got two lathes with 8 foot long cast iron
beds (one 20" swing, the other 17, both about 60 between centers) for
$250 and $400, respectively. In both cases I simply paid the asking
price, not caring to haggle overly with the surviors. The less expensive
one is a wood lathe with metalspinning abilities (or a patternmakers
lathe, depending who you ask) - anyway, it was set up for wood. The more
expensive of the two is a full-on metalworking engine lathe - it could
be converted to a very solid wood lathe, but I happen to have the other,
and do metalwork as well. Both have plain (Babbitt) bearings, which
appear to be in good shape, and run quietly; but which could be reworked
if need be. It does take a minute or so per day to oil the bearings - I
can live with that.

If you buy the same lathe 2 days later from a used machinery dealer, the
price will have gone up a great deal...and the family will probably have
taken somewhat less money for it, too. Try asking a real estate agent -
while I've found both of mine in the classifieds, they were both in
houses that were about to be put on the market.

Toss the remainder of your budget into a new drive system (a surplus new
drive system, or splurge and get a brand new drive system) either 3
phase VFD or DC, and you have a very solid lathe with speeds from 0 to
whatever, and several steps available (from the old speed system) for
different torque to speed relationships if your drive system and use
demand it.

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Cats, Coffee, Chocolate...vices to live by