I'm looking at a few different options for an upcoming website of mine, and I'm seriously considering buying a ready-made template. What's a reasonable price to pay for a high-quality look? I don't know if I'm better off buying through a big reseller (like templates.com) or an individual designer.

How deep is a hole in the ground?

The question is not so much how much should you pay, but rather how much CAN you pay. I can give you names of designers that will build you a site for $500 if that's your budget, or if you have more budget and want more features, in the $1500 range. It all depends on 3 factors;

1) Quality
2) Speed (how quickly it's delivered)
3) Price

Pick two, you'll never get all 3.

By the same token of the designers that build the $500, I know they've built sites for upwards of $120,000 also. Again, it depends on the budget and the features.

CUSTOM is CUSTOM, so you'll pay more than a template through template monster ($50-$400 per template).

conor said it very well. It all depends on the three factors that conor listed. Pick two as you won't get three As always, conor knows his stuff.

Great advice from Conor. Another thing to consider would be it's value to you. Are you using the site for branding, ecommerce, gaming ...

Thanks for the advice, Conor. If I can't have all three, my two top priorities would be price and quality. I'm trying to keep the design aspect under $200, and the cheaper, the better (which is precisely why I'm looking into ready-made templates).

Assuming I do end up going with a ready-made design rather than anything customized, can you recommend any sellers that offer a good quality/price trade-off?

If you're going readymade, check out www.templatemonster.com - THOUSANDS of templates. While we're an affiliate of them, I gave you the direct link as posting affiliate links in forums is not something I do.

I've purchased templates from them in the past and never had a problem. I do not have them do the custom colors etc (that starts to increase the price) but for a template out of the box it's reasonable.

If you're looking to go custom, you'd be looking for designers who are just starting out if you wish to keep in the $200 range. This can be good and bad. Gives them a good start, but it also means that you could be dealing with novices or kids working on the side and taking a VERY long time to get a design completed.

I had a company just recently who was offering custom designs for $250. I didn't want to do one on one of my sites and I wasn't planning to go live that month, so figured I'd just pass it off to them. Well here I am 3 months later, and sure I got a mockup (only after pestering) but I still don't have a design for approval yet and their response to contact is less than acceptable.

Today (yes, really Today) is their last deadline. If the project is not delivered by this afternoon (as agreed to by them on Friday), then the contract is terminated and the funds are refunded. I'm too long delaying a project becaues they are "sick", "school", "family", "death in family", "designer sick", "computer crash", "host problems" or any of the other excuses that have been pushed through.

At the end of the day, the old adage remains true - you get what you paid for. Too bad this guy not only loses MY business, but any business from the clients I would have referred to him with.

If it's a high quality theme then they should have higher rates. I've seen non-unique for as high as $800. Your paying for the quality, but then you might see the theme somewhere else. If your branding I would go for unique, or a freelance designer to design your theme from scratch.

My personal opinion, if you starting your branding you can use template, but after you see when your business are growing you will need very fast to update you design to unique one, but as possible as can be it must be similar to template.
Because visitors can't feel that hey are lost

I would not recommend purchasing from a large template store, mainly because the chances of someone else having the same template is higher, and template sites usually have very flash-heavy templates that are immediately noticeable as templates. I would recommend looking around on forums and find individual designers who have made templates and are looking to sell them. This is not only a cheaper solution but a more professional one as well.

There is a "downloaded" number on the template sites that show you how many times that particular template has been downloaded, but lets get real for a second. If 43 people downloaded the same template, statistcially what are the chances that a visitor to your site is going to see the same (EXACT SAME) site with someone else?

I've used many templates over the years, taken what I liked about them and bashed them together to make the design I wanted. Templates are a great way to get online quickly without much money out of pocket.

Besides, even when you do spend the $4,000 on a custom design and site, you'll have someone come along to your site one day, like the design, steal it, change the colors and claim it as their design. That's how the web works - always taking ideas from others and improving upon them. Maybe not flat out copy, but the concept is taken.

I think it's a good idea to use more than one template to create a unique one. However nothing really bests making your own template from scratch, then it will be 100% unique.

I see people jack sites and claim them as their own on a daily basis. What it boils down to is that the web isn't your good ole boy, it's like a rat race to get the best.

There's very little that's "Unique" on the web...that much you learn rather quickly.

We have a designer in house that does our designs and pages. In the past, we have seen customers use templates and it seems to come to the same result. I didn't know it was going to be this much work to get it done right. For small businesses and such, the idea of templates are so easy really hurt their long term image of the web design industry because of their initial experience. For a non unique template I wouldn't spend more than $75.00.

See, my advice is that if you can, go for a free template and alter it completely to make it look unique. There are many out there, just google and you will find even the premium templates freely available. Tweak them and make it unique.