Not to be dismissive, but I had to comment here:

> A $5000 budget would barely suffice to run something like gpt-oss 120b (OpenAI’s open model that is okay at code-writing tasks).

I play with this model on a $1,200 shoebox-sized PC. If/when I do want to outsource my work, it does perfectly fine. Snappy, even, while sipping <200W. Keeps my data local, too.