I try to give the following advice to every new hobby woodworker who asks me about tools ->Quote:
Here is my dilemma, chances are that whatever house I end-up buying I will not have a lot of space for a dedicated shop.
1) There are two ways to work with wood. The first is moving the wood through the tool and the second is moving the tool over the wood. With the first option, you will need room for at least 2x the length of your longest workpiece (due to infeed and outfeed space). Some woodworkers accomplish this by moving their tools around or opening garage doors. With the second option, you will not be moving the wood much at all, you will be moving the tools across the wood. You will only need 1x the length of the workpiece using this system. The Festool system as well as handtools are example of this work style. IMO, for smaller shops the second option makes far most sense. In your case where you do not even have a large door opening I would consider it a requirement.
2) Don't buy a tool until you actually need it.
3) There are often multiple ways to complete a given woodworking operation with different tools.