new community travel forum.... HELP

[bnroz]

I am looking at creating a online community travel forum, where people can go to chat topics everything and anything about travel, from hotels, flights, airlines, airports, frequent flyer programs, holidays, road trips, sporting tours, group tours, backpacking and latest cheap travel deals.....

I have actually created a forum, which i used a free online forum website to create, its has only been up a week and user are just starting to registar and post topics, etc.....

I am thinking once the forum gets momentum and has a large number of user and topics going, i want to introduce a home page for the website, which will display latest travel deals, and also display the latest hot topics of the forum on this home page, then people can click on these hot topics and be directed to the forum page.

I have all these ideas in my head but i dont know where to start, i want to create an online community forum, people have noted Joomla but looks complex to use.....

I have been quoted from web designers a price of $3500, then another has quoted $10,000 to $15,000 Australian dollars!

I also have asked these people if they can mock up a shell of the homepage, so i can get an idea at least of what they are capable of before i commit to any $'s.

does anybody here do website design and able to help me out or know of any great web developers willing to help me on this project or give advice tips....

Thanks,

Brenton