Whether you would want one of those more expensive type blenders, depends on your cooking habits. For just smoothies, and puréed soups and the like, a regular blender should suit you fine. Here's a link to Serious Eats, where they tested budget blenders:
After testing 11 models, we found the four best budget blenders under $200. Some of our top picks have features like presets and multiple speed options.
www.seriouseats.com
They also have testings of the expensive ones, and immersion blenders you might want to look at - just do a search for blenders up on the top of their page.
The Vitamix will grind things a lot finer that a regular blender, plus make flour out of most grains, beans, and other dry ingredients. With some things, when grinding up tomatoes and peppers, FI, it grinds up the skin and seeds so fine that recipes I used to pour the purée through a strainer, and strain out a small amount of skin and seeds, nothing would strain out! Many of those Mexican sauces especially, this would save me a lot of time with, and the sauce can also be left thicker, before cooking - more water has to be added to circulate the mix in regular blenders. Also great for making Thai curry pastes, with all that thick stuff. It all depends on your cooking habits!