Would buying the VCR/DVD recorder be the best way to go?

I’ve got old family VHS tapes that I want to transfer to DVD.
I found this recorder for about $175 (including shipping) and this review at Amazon.

I could pay someone to do it, but I have about 12 tapes. Further, not all of the tapes are full. It would require some further editing to get a smooth finished product.
I got some pricing from a video production place that was a little confusing (Something about $17.99 for the first blah blah and $omething for every blah blah after that) but doing rough calculations at the time it seemed to me I’d be looking at well over $175 to get them transferred.

Also, I wonder if I could pick up some pocket change transferring other people’s VHS tapes to DVD?

I appreciate your thoughts and opinions Jellies.