Affordable steel string acoustic guitar model suggestion?

I like listening to guitars but not knowing them very well. Have a bump anyway.

Also please let me know if I shouldn't join the gibs :)

I hava an Hofma HF250 Mahogany Natural with Sapele everywhere. I paid pretty cheap when I bought and I must say, the sound is trully amazing for such a cheap acoustic guitar. The trick was... Search! Search like a lot! Go to stores, check videos reviews, check people using them on internet, check them comparing them using the very same pickup and preamp. When you find yourself the best acoustic guitar, you'll feel something close to "yup, that's the one".

I went to a folk guitar class a long time ago and played steel string acoustic. I got a Hohner on the advice of others and was quite happy with it.

For fingerstyle blues you may want to consider a classical/ wide neck guitar and nylon strings rather than steel. My most recent acoustic purchase was a regular-neck Epiphone that I paid around $300 USD for, and it's awesome. So you can get a fairly nice instrument without totally breaking the bank. My very first guitar was a hand-me-down from my dad that was a no-name classical, but it worked well for learning.

Someone else mentioned finding a used one at a local shop and I think that's your best bet. Guitars can be really personal, while I love Schechters and will recommend them left and right, it might not be the best for what you want. But getting to play several instruments and figuring out what body, neck, type of wood, etc you like are all important things to figure out.

As for being lefty vs righty, if the guitar doesn't have a pick guard, it shouldn't matter very much (on an acoustic). If you buy at a shop you can ask them to set up the guitar for you (which you should do anyway) and ask them to restring lefty. If the guitar is electric or has an acoustic pick up, then the input will be at the top of the guitar rather than at the bottom, which would be annoying if you ever wanted to plug into an amp. A true lefty guitar will be a little more expensive.

Why not visit local mucial store and ask for a help? You should look for wide neck guitar, it's better for fingerstyle. Narrow neck guitars are more suitable for chords.

You could have a look at Squire acoustic guitars. Made by Fender as a cheaper alternative, they are not at all bad for what you pay and would fit inside your budget.

https://www.muziker.de/fender-squier-sa-105ce-natural (Squire)
or even a Fender:
https://www.kirstein.de/Dreadnought-Modelle/Fender-FA-125CE-Dreadnought-WN-NAT.html?gclsrc=ds

edit: ok - perhaps not. I did not realize the big difference in availability and pricing on left handed guitars - I'd assumed they'd be just as easy to order.

I'd advise against buying guitars without looking and "feeling" them.

I once wanted a certain model by Ibanez badly and then it turned out it didn't fit me at all, I couldn't like, play a single clean chord on it, because, while the basic techniques are the same, everyone still has some differences with the way they grip it, with the angle, with finger placement etc.

I myself have a Fender CD60CE, cost me around $200 back in the days. Kinda difficult to compare prices now as I'm in Russia and our prices are kinda inflated nowadays. Great for fingerstyle playing, but it's a dreadnought so perhaps not quite what you want.
My friend plays a Washburn (EA-15 I think) and really likes it, but I don't think it's really suited for fingerstyle playing. Take a look at other Washburn models though, some of them should be affordable I think.

I've had a few acoustic guitars but the first one I got for myself was a Norman B20. It wasn't much to look at and it wasn't well known outside of Canada back then but I just fell in love with the sound at the guitar shop. Took me quite a while to save enough and they've about doubled in price in the last 20 years, most likely due to a lot of the most precious woods used in good quality guitars going into conservation.

But enough about me, onto your query. I have not played the G9500 but from what I read it's a pretty good guitar for beginner, albeit a lightweight (literally) and a bit more reliable on delivering crisp high sharps than rich bass notes. It won't take you much further than a year or two into your beginnings but it's a good enough choice for the price tag. It may sound a little twangy depending on what you play though.

If you get into it though, think about a cutaway for your next one. It really extends your range by giving you access to the higher notes for soloing or even slide.

If you don't mind a strange looking bird, though, I'd recommend the Martin Backpacker, which comes in left-handed model for about 200 euros. It has a solid mahogany and spruce body which makes for a very rich sound for the size and weight. You won't get the 2,000$ Martin sound but you come ridiculously close for 1/10th the price. And you also get access to the higher notes due to the design.

I have a Fender CD-60 CE. It's a budget electro acoustic guitar (with steel strings). But it's a very good one in my opinion! But I have to admit, that I'm also a beginner, So I took that one, because it was a recommendation for me as well.

It is a little over your set price, but maybe you can get it somwhere on discount ;)
Here is an example on youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNnTYioq4Sg

https://www.staggmusic.com/en/products/guitars-and-basses/acoustic-guitars/

Should be in your price range, and are decent for beginners. Had one myself for a decade and only sold it maybe 2 years ago.

Thomann has cheap and decent acoustic guitar with steel strings for starters, they are also electrified which is a plus. They deliver in all Europe AFAIK. If this advice was already given, take the free bump!

I totally support this endeavor and wish you good luck!

Right handed vs left handed:

Playing guitar is an ambidextrous activity. Your right hand needs to pluck the right strings and vary the strength to control dynamics, while your left hand needs to move up and down the fretboard and hold down the right strings at the right frets. Is one hand's job harder than the other? I honestly don't know. I don't attribute any particular benefit to guitar-handedness, and encourage new students to learn right-handed since that opens up more guitar options and lets them easily play a friend's guitar. Since you already started learning right handed, I would just stick with that.

Guitars to look for:

I'm not sure what's available to you in Germany, but here's some general recommendations. I would recommend the smaller body style (Folk, Orchestra Model (OM), Concert Hall, Parlor) over the larger Dradnought and Jumbo bodies. As far as brands, Yamaha and Godin both make great steel string acoustics. Godin have a variety of sub-brands - Norman, Simon & Patrick, Seagull, Art & Lutherie - which are all good.

Edit: Oh, just see you've settled on the Gretsch. It looks good.

Learning:

JustinGuitar is what I would recommend. I find YT lessons to be too scattershot, many aren't actually useful, the ability level of the lessons varries greatly (one video on a subject may be beneath you, while the next is way over your head), and the "teachers" vary greatly in their ability to actually teach and convey information clearly. It's too easy to waste your time trying to find something worthwhile.

JustinGuitar, on the other hand, is logically organized into a logical curriculum, and Justin does a great job of explaining things. I think going through his course is the next best thing to private lessons.

Just remember that guitar is hard to learn, even harder now that you're older, you'll likely suck for a while (months? years?), and the more you learn the more you realize you have left to learn, but it's awesome and rewarding. Mark down your progress, so that when you feel demoralized like you're not making any you can look back to where you were last month and realize just how much you've progress you've made. Good luck, and I hope you have a blast with it! :)

Hey. Personally, I would recommend a used instrument, you can buy great japan vintage guitar for 200 pounds. I don't like new cheap instruments, but you might check brands like crafter or recording king, those are really popular lately and sounds really decent. Also, it doesn't really matter if you are lefthanded, you can just restring a guitar without the cut upsidedown. The guy on the video left-handed as well btw...and it's a smaller guitar as you wanted.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=490jihZTmSQ

I can't help much for a specific model as I primarily play electric and my acoustic guitar is a nylon strings guitar. I'm also not super experienced.

But here's my two cents on the lefty thing. I'm right handed in life but somehow playing left handed was always more natural for me, so I play lefty. I know some lefty people who like you play right handed, some of them because they were told it's better, some of them just like me somehow felt it more natural to pick with their non dominant hand. Point is, everyone is different about this and there is no universal answer about if you should play righty or lefty, it boils down to you and how you feel about it. If you feel more comfortable a certain way, go for it. Not because you are left handed in life means you will inevitably be better playing the way we call left handed. Some of us are weird like that and are reversed x)
You started learning right-handed, and it felt natural to you - I say keep at it. No reason to switch if you don't feel like you are going against your instinct or whatnot. If you always felt good playing righty, it will probably be a waste of time and money to get a lefty instrument. You'll probably realise just how much muscle theory you already had the other way around and how unnatural it feels to switch.
Also the obvious argument that lefty guitars are more expensive (as a point or reference, I bought a guitar for 535€, the same model right handed costs 475€), and you will have less choice. I personally don't really care about it because I don't buy a guitar every so often and don't plan to ever do, and despite there being less choice there still is plenty of choice (it also helps not getting GAS lol). But as your budget is limited, and you already can play righty, this doesn't seem to be a good move.

Hope it helps somehow, good luck on getting back into guitar you'll probably have a lot of fun 🤘(blues is fun)
Also my two cents again but I strongly suggest you use backing tracks as a practice tool, there are a lot of blues ones out there! Jaming over backing tracks is an incredibly powerful and fun way to practice and it helped me develop my technique and musicianship as well as my understanding of music more than anything.

I have been thinking of getting a guitar aswell i have never played them but they just sound very nice and it could be a lot of fun to learn and master it. Have a bumpo!