This is probably the best advice of all. Nothing teaches like experience, as a trip through the "Every Mistake I Ever Made" thread should make abundantly clear.
http://taperssection.com/index.php?topic=150209.0If you read a bunch of this thread and don't do any of the stupid things on it then you will make a great recording. It mostly involves remembering settings, accessories, and batteries, plugging things into the right holes, and not pushing the wrong buttons.
I think with your budget what people here are recommending is some high end capsules with active cables, combined with a preamp/phantom power setup. This is all indeed the best you can do and you can just about pull it off for that budget. However, I have gotten some amazing recordings with electret condenser mics which don't require high voltage phantom power and the attendant expensive or difficult to obtain gear. Consider the AT853 or CA mics which can operate off of a battery box or small preamp. Search Archive to listen to how these different rigs sound.
Here's a sample of the AT853 hypers with the Church Audio 9100 preamp. I got the mics and box for like $250 or something, and they regularly perform as well as my more expensive mics. For some reason I don't get the same high end response from the cardioid capsules, by a long shot. So I don't use them anymore, at all, regardless of how close I am.
https://archive.org/details/gat2010-05-22.flac16