Originally Posted by
Fahrenheit531
Don't be intimidated by tales of wildly overpriced vintage stuff you'll have to score from ebay and blah blah whatever. Vintage bicycles are very wallet-friendly unless you are going for a full restoration on a truly special bike. Get the one that fits you better. Expect some outlays for tires, cables, etc., but I've found most old components clean up to solid functionality unless the previous owner has truly beat them to hell.
And as suggested above, spend some time in the Classic & Vintage forum.
This is very good advice. My addition would be (even though I love them and have one) to avoid French bikes WITH French threads if parts need replacing. Those parts can be hard to find, (especially french thread pedals) except for new French spec sealed bottom brackets that are available.
I would also recommend getting a bike with a cassette rear wheel versus a freewheel, as the removers for some older freewheels are hard to find. However there are good rear freewheels still available in English threading. With a good English threaded vintage bike you have lots of flexibility. Vintage bike does not mean you have to restore it to original specs or even period specs. A lot of the more recent technology upgrades can be retrofitted and will work.
One advantage to certain ages of vintage bikes is you can run fatter tires, but with some bikes you absolutely can not go larger. If you are considering going larger, than shop carefully as going to a fatter tire is one area that cannot be modified, while you can always go narrower.
Good luck.