The ONLY solution is to get approved as a Google Maps Business account. Many will not qualify. Outside of that you are at the mercy of Google. It is a free service after all.
As for information before purchase, it is readily accessible on my website and the main SLP plugin is free.
Whether or not your server will overload the queries is all about how many people your provider crams on one server and what percentage is doing ANY kind of Google API interaction. "Cheap hosting alternative" and non-shared servers are diametrically opposed.