Honestly I wouldn't worry too much, I mean yeah get one with a fan but it's not integral to getting it running.
Install Home Assistant Operating System on an SSD when you can, SD cards aren't made for the read/write you'll get from HAOS but again, it's not integral.
So yeah do those things, but boot it without a case and SSD for now and just play with it. Get the Google drive backup add-on for it. When you upgrade to an SSD just pull the backup from there and you're golden.