I want to create a sensor that senses the distance to an object once every second, to detect position changes (doesn’t have to be wildly accurate; accuracy of a few cm. is fine). I looked into some sensors, including the VL53L0X, HC-SR04, JSN-SR04T, Sharp IR sensor (which came with my Electron kit) and a few others, but I’m unsure which one would be the most reliable.
The HC-SR04 is cheap, but perhaps too cheap and prone to some failure/quality degradation over time? Also seems to draw a lot of current. The Sharp IR sensor I had wasn’t really so accurate for me. Then I looked at the VL53L0X, but after reading a lenghty topic here on the forum it seemed people had issues with getting reliable readings at more than half a meter.
Given these requirements:
Placement: Indoor, in a dark (mostly) storage area to measure available space
Sensing distance: should sense at 30cm or less, and at least up to 1.5 meters (more would be great though!)
Sensing accuracy: minimum of 2-3cm accuracy
Sensing frequency: Can be whatever really, just a single accurate reading every hour is sufficient for me
Sensing cone: can be whatever
Cost: preferably not over $50, have to save some money for other projects 
Since I attach a lot of value to the opinion of people here on the forum, I was wondering which sensor would you guys use personally?