B.J. –
Welcome to Singletracks, and greetings from another Springs denizen! It’s good to see another Springs local show up here, so we can together gloat over the fact that we’ve got one of the best trail systems right in town. 😼
Since you brought up the cost of disk-brakes, I can tell you that sets of take-off hydraulic brakes for under $150 are common nowadays. Very often bike shops will receive a MTB which was ordered by a customer and who wanted better brakes, so the LBS will swap out the OEM brakes for the customer’s preferred stoppers. They’ll then resell the OEM brakes for a fraction of what they’d cost normally.
Online bike component retailers also sell a lot of take-off components, often for as much as 50%-off!
Anyways, if you’re interested, I can take you to an LBS that I’m very familiar with, and they’ve got a good selection of older (+5yrs) used mountainbikes at reasonable prices. I don’t care who you are….. nobody deserves to be riding a Wallyworld deathcycle! 😉