I agree with this. You can get a lot of hardware for not a lot, especially if you build your own.
If money’s not that tight, another option is a modern NAS that can run services and Docker. Depends on what you want to do with it in the long term: file server vs All The Services.
A few years ago it was time to replace my ancient NAS and I was tossing up between building a dedicated server with something like TrueNAS and Nextcloud, or opting for a QNAP or Synology that could do it all for me. Opted for a Synology DS920+ and haven’t looked back. It can’t do anything processor-intensive, but it nails it for everything else. I have ~30 Docker stacks running on it, including Wireguard, and SWAG for SSL+MFA external services. Synology Drive (GDrive) and Photos (GPhotos/Picasa) on Linux, Windows, Mac, Android and iOS let me ditch the last of my cloud services. It’s also running Plex Media Server, tying into an Nvidia ShieldTV as the client.
SLS (Soft Landing System) then Slackware. 30+ years and still enjoying the Linux ride…