I agree that choosing a college is overwhelming. You’ve gotten some good advice here about college guides and niche. You can also do an online college match search. Big Future at collegeboard.org lets you set a lot of different parameters to shape your search–it may turn up some schools you have not thought of. There are some other sites that do the same thing.
Your school may use Naviance or a similar service to gather information on where students from your HS/school district have gone to college and what scores/GPA got them accepted, rejected or waitlisted. Our school system has it available through Blackboard accounts. Check with your guidance office.
And about the money piece–you do need to check with your parents. If your family is able to cover $70K a year for 4 years, then you have unlimited possibilities. If your family income qualifies you for generous financial aid, then you also have a lot of opportunities.
If, however, your family is somewhere in between (like my family), you will need to consider the costs of schools. Many schools do give generous merit aid/scholarships, some of them automatically if you have certain grades/scores. Other schools have chosen to award only need-based aid, which could mean that you will be expected the full cost of attendance (or borrow in order to do so). After making an initial list of colleges, we eliminated schools that do not give merit aid because they would certainly require going into debt while an equivalent-level college that gives merit aid would mean graduating debt-free. If you search for “merit aid” on most colleges websites, you will find their policies. [Once you have things narrowed down more, you can look at the “net price calculator” on each school’s site for more specific cost numbers.]
Going to an in-state school will also (most likely) be affordable, but it does sound like you would like to attend college away from home.
Good luck in your search!