It has been many years since I was at Flightline in Dunedin, but they were a pretty big company back then. That is often not the best for a new aircraft owner as there is too many layers of management. There where certainly some good LAME's there then.
Call around the clubs or drop a question on the local flying web pages (ask for PM reply's only) for the best maintenance organisations and even best LAME's around.
Find your potential budget now and what you can throw at it each year. That is needed to guide you and work with component overhaul costs or future costs.
Another big caution is aircraft that have sat for a fair amount of time - many engines fail at 50 - 200 hours later, often due to camshaft/lifter corrosion. Common on Lycoming as no easy/cheap way to look at them in an inspection.
A LAME would probable have a chat about the basics to conciser for a few drinks and a meal at the local drinking place, but a good pre purchase is pretty close to an Annual Inspection cost (less on parts but more on log book research), but this cost is often then well balanced in the final purchase price negotiation.
A C182 would certainly be a target machine, but in that price range, that many do not even think about are some C206's. The operating costs are also very similar including fuel burn believe it or not.