At the low end for monochrome printers, I have been happy with Brother. Such as:

https://www.officedepot.com/a/products/957941/Brother-HL-L2395DW-Wireless-Monochrome-Black/

You definitely want laser (not inkjet) because the toner in a laser won't dry up like inkjet. You can go months without printing and a laser will fire right up in my experience.

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Get a brother laser and save yourself headaches. One of my best purchases More on reddit.com

I got a Brother Laser Printer for about 90 bucks off Amazon and it is great. Much cheaper to use than an inkjet and you never have to worry about a cartridge drying out. More on reddit.com

Highly recommend a Brother Laser Jet Printer. Color anything simply cost more. What it comes down to when talking quality is how good do you really need that quality because for most people Laser Jet will simply be good enough. If not your going to pay much more and it tends to be a bit more problematic when it comes to ink. Ink cost much more than toner. Ink dries up if not used and toner does not. Ink clogs nozzles and can require test pages before an actual print wasting even more ink. Toner doesn't use nozzles. Laser Jet isn't the best quality but it simply reduces your cost and toner cartridges never dry up if not used. I get the feeling you won't need an ink printer. If you were strictly printing photos then that would be much different. Your best bet is to determine what print technology you want to use first. My guess is after simply taking a look at the cost you"ll determine Laser Jet to be the best fit. Keep, in mind Color still will be more expensive than B/W. Where you have one toner cartridge with B/W you have four cartridges with Color Laser Jets. Color Toner simply cost more. The initial toner cartridges you get with a Laser Printer are starter cartridges only and from then on it's on you. The less costly Laser Printer you get the greater chance those replacement cartridges will cost more than the printer originally cost you. These all vary depending on the model you get. Granted the page count per toner cartridge is an estimate at best but at least that gives you some idea to go by, so use that when determining what your costs are going to be. I highly recommend you take a look at the cost of your supplies such as replacement cartridges and replacement drums which Brother Laser Jets require at specific intervals. See what various packages of toner cartridges can cost and specifically look at the highest capacity toner cartridges as upfront it cost more but per print will cost you less. The larger more expensive printers may cost you more upfront but in the long run cost you less per page to operate. You may very well want to buy at least your first replacement toner cartridges just so you have those on hand when you run out. Also learn the tricks of how to extend the life of your toner cartridges when the machine tells you they need to be replaced. Typically this has less to do with how much toner is left and more to do with how many pages have been printed. YouTube can be real helpful here. This can vary by machine. Some people use third party cartridges as the cost for these will be much less. I don't but supposedly if you look on Amazon you can find some that may work perfectly fine for you. Your going to have to look at the reviews, however I personally wouldn't rely on this just in case they aren't as good, but like I said I don't do that but some swear by it. Given the cost once you look it's pretty easy to tell why they do, Not only would I recommend you get a Brother Laser Jet I would recommend you consider getting a MFC for the added functionality. These things last a good long time so it's typically worth getting those with greater functionality. I bought a more expensive unit personally because it came with a Multi Feeder for the scanner. Manual scanning is a pain in the ass and takes much longer. I'm thinking you"ll be easily able to justify this in the long run. Compare the various printers side by side and the various functionality and determine not only your current needs but what you might need for years to come. I even got a fax capable unit just because I use that every once in a great while. It used to be separate scanners where best that is no longer true and besides you don't get a multi feed scanner on a separate stand alone scanner. More on reddit.com