I don’t know exactly how rough the market is now, but I’ve been happily using my moto g8 power (intl) that I bought for 170$ in 2020 when I lost my old one. Motorola makes some very good, cheap phones that can also be rooted (I’m not knowledgeable on this, I just use pared down apps on mine because I mostly value the 3 day battery life and regular phone/email features).
I looked into redmi back then but even w/o the US ban it wasn’t worth it.
The Danes, or the Angles, or the Saxons? Or the Romans? Or the …