Is anybody in hifi on a budget? They do start off that way, and then things spiral out of control very quickly. Might as well consciously jump and try to soften the fall instead of bumping down uncontrollably all the way
Then there is always the VPI Scout / Classic (and maybe others?) design whereby you can have multiple arm-wands with different cartridges mounted and aligned for a quick swap. This is particularly useful if your phono preamp only has a single input.