First Harrison M250 is small / light.
Harrison 300, Kent, looked really nice.
13x40" - 2500 lbs - nice.
On the other, 2500 rpm/7.5 hp, VFD, nice.
* Heavier, more RPM, more HP, in this order. *
Anything else is cheap to swap.
BUT...
Anything new from china or anywhere, oem, for 5-6k, is really good.
Ie not Grizzly/middleman/badge-engineered.
Thus any PM-offers or similar, will be really good, new.
Buy by mass, speed, power, imho.
But "new" also has high value.
My import lathe was excellent, but very heavy, very rigid, for its size, in the 12x heavy light-industrial-types.
With poor fit&finish, but 10x the lathe compared to the Logan/Grizzly light-weight offerings.
My POV:
I would buy a new import, heaviest I could find, with a VFD included.
Because they are cheap, have great rigidity, and a VFD gives you lots of torque/range/flexibility cheap.
And the new machines have great TIR.
And with a new = already programmed VFD, and as-new comes with a guarantee against electronics failures short-term and motor failures and guarantees against lack of accuracy/TIR etc.
With good TIR, good rpm/VFD/power, mass=rigidity, YOU can make anything, 100% certain.
And any parts lack/loss/failure is easily fixed, cheap.
And
new comes with 3-jaw, 4-jaw, both steadies, etc. mostly, worth 2-3k$ easily.
I do not disagree with "old iron" posts as such .. at all.
And many skilled experienced people here can deliver 2-3x the value, sometimes, when they find / recover an old machine of great value.
So as a business decision, I myself would never buy "old iron" for immediate profitable or productive use.
Otoh...
As a sideline for experienced guys, they sometimes can and do gain very valuable top-shelf machines, with low initial cash outlay.
But they spend a lot of time at it, a lot of opportunity costs, a lot of hours.
If You or I needed to pay for their time, it would not be worth it.