You can find many guides and recommendations for buying a telescope that you can find online. The best telescope is the one that will be used. The best advice before purchasing anything is to come to a public star party or outreach event of the club and look through the telescopes of the club members and discuss with them about what you want. Many people have strong expectations about what is is possible to see through an eyepiece (size and image quality of objects). With visual astronomy, you will not see images such as what you can see from the Hubble Space Telescope or images that you see in magazines that were obtained using cameras.
Do NOT buy a telescope at a convenience store or a toy store. If you want to stay under $200, just stick with binoclars. The best telescope for starting visual astronomy would be a dobsonian telescope with the aperture going with the budget. A 6 inch Dobsonian telescope is about $500 USD. For electronic-assisted astronomy,All-in-One Smart Telescopes can now be found at about $400 USD.
There are multiple parameters to consider besides the budget. Do you want to do visual astronomy (looking through an eyepiece) or electronic-assisted astronomy (example: looking through the screen of a phone or a tablet). The location is important. It will determine what it is possible to observe in relation to the light pollution. In an urban area, it will not be possible to see many deep sky objects even with a large aperture telescope. If the location does not allow good observations, it is necessary to think about a telescope that can be transportable, i.e., that can be easily put into a car. If you have lots of light pollution and you cannot/dont want to drive, then the choice will be limited to the moon and planets (Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn). If you don't know a dark place where you can clearly see the milky way, then the views will be limited to planets and very few other objects.
Sky & Telescope Buying Guide