[MikeM]

This is very intresting to me as I recently moved from a house that had a local gym with everything less than a mile away, to a house that had no gym within reason and I have to create a home gym for myself.

So, not being made of money, I needed to decide what I wanted in my home gym. First choice was squat stands as I could not afford a cage and stands were a cheaper alternative. Then a bench and barbell and weights.

That's bare bones. Stands were $240 (new), bench was $40 (craiglist), I chose to invest in a barbell and 210 lb of bumpers so that was $600 because I love the olympic lifts and choose to continue doing them to the best of my ability, then some craigslist plates to round out the process and there you go.

I also chose a Lat stand with row capability off craigslist for $120 too as that's a weakness I need to address, but basically that's what I spent to be ready to lift next week continuing on my 5-3-1 program.

Bottom line: looking at the question as what do you really need, I'd say you need bar, plates, stands, bench, and a pull up bar.

You have that you're done. My .02