I'm kinda burned trying to "save" on lenses. I think that if I have to drop that kind of money on a lens, I dont want to regret because I tried to save a bit.
Every time I cheaped out on a lens, it led to disapointments. But the two last ones I bought, I went for the best in their category and i'm glad I did. (Really love the 50mm 1.4 and 12-24 wide) That's why I want the VRII version; but its also the only version of the 70-200 that I got on my price list.
Besides, I dont want to bring my tripod all the time so going without VR is out of the question.
I dont have anything but nikkor lenses, but I get special pricing with them too; so that explains a lot.