Sorry I have never hunted buff in SA, my buff were in Zim and some time ago. Wild, spooky, cagy, on foot tracking, even a sniff of human stink and they were gone. Shot only hard bossed old bulls, awesome real hunts. As for cost, my first safari in 04, 18 day leopard, buff and many PG, daily rate and TF, all for $18 US. What a steal, but actual hunt costs are still very reasonable today I think. The other portions of a safari have gone crazy, lodging before/after, D&P, shipping, and such.
In SA I did feed buff, they came up to vehicle or camp veranda lookouts for a banana hand out on many hunting areas, others we drove around them and the banana piles to get to camps. I hunted CBLion last year in SA. Report is posted here. I will hunt buff again, Zim or swamp in Mozambique.
MB