artists usually don't hire artists.
So true however because we get hired by customers who make mistakes, we do have some small advice to offer. :)
an you give me any advice besides hiring a foreigner? I appreciate all the help
First, never buy any thing you can make yourself, it's simple yet I get hundreds of clients paying expensive prices for simple things that could be researched on the internet.
Second, when hiring a artist you are paying for the time not the product. You can't expect to pay the low prices you do at asset stores, models made for asset stores sell over a long period of time and slowly bring in funds and do in time pay for the effort.
The lowest paying option you can get from a artist is to pay per model instead of time, the way this works is that the artist will work on the model when they don't have any other important jobs. You get a huge price cut this way -still more expensive than buying from a asset store- however you don't have a solid deadline to receive the model.
The last thing you can do is reduce the complexity of the model to reduce the time and effort needed to make it, reducing the price of the model.
This is what I recommend you do for your first project, because you won't need AAA quality models for your game.
So what you do is contact your artist of choice and tell them you want a paper/ flat low poly model. This means a low poly model that is modeled in the most simplest way possible. We use these models for LOD levels and planing.
Here is one I made as a example, how it looks. http://imgur.com/DnpgR8u The .Blend: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3hHgiNtHATdZ3gwaXd2LUthNjg/view?usp=sharing
The difference between this model and a AAA model is a high poly model and better topology, this models also isn't UV mapped.
You can see that it is a low poly model 1 560 tri, and that it has a good shape and form, there are also a few ways to reduce poly count.
From the Blend you will see that at a distance it looks almost as good as any AAA gun, that is because it's very similar to how a AAA gun's LOD would look like( there wouldn't be as much overlapping mesh.)
The gun is perfect for a low budget shooter game, because you will be at a distance and won't notice much detail while playing. The best part is that almost any 3D modeler can make it. All a 3D modeler needs to know is: custom normals, shape theory(or practice) and basic modeling.
It's also a good target for beginners because it teaches the basics and doesn't need texture experience.
The model took 1 hour 12 minutes to make, that would make it's time worth $25 on average. At a asset store if you pay more than $3 you are paying to much(It would sell around eight copies in a month). Last if you hired a artist at a per-model price it would be $10-15.
If you find a artist willing to work for you on your terms chances are they can make models like these. Also I bet you could make models like these, if not guns then street signs, pot plants and other basic objects; that way the artist can focus on the important models while you help with the grunt work.
For LODs you can use Blender it has a tool that generates LODs, it's just not the same quality as Simplygon.
Edit: Don't merge the mesh in Blender, it will destroy the custom normal data, export as .fbx with smooth set to "Face" to import the model with custom normals into a engine as one model.