I have accumulated several tripods over the last 30 years and here is what I've learned that might help you.
1) If you want to do pans or tilts with a tripod be sure to get a tripod that has a fluid head and is heavy enough to support your camera with a good wind and not get any shake.
A nice way to make these pans and tilts a lot smoother even with a fluid head is to add a
deflated balloon to the tripod handle. Expand the throat of the balloon around the handle end so that the rest of the balloon lies like a limp rag. You may have to squeeze the air out of it after you insert it on the handle. Once in place, take your thumb and index finger and hold on to the loose end, gently move the camera with the head loosened for pan or tilt. You will immediately see how the movement is vastly improved for smoothness, so much so, you can even increase the focal length further with no camera shake. A 12" or 18" balloon works great and these are usually under 50 cents each.
2) It's far better to have a steady shot from the start then to rely on post production stabilization software to fix it.
3) "Portability links to opportunity". Remember this as a good reason to have a tripod that is so handy that you can almost stuff it in your pocket. I recently bought a JOBY Gorilla that has proven to rank very high on versatility and portability:
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/633362-REG/Joby_GP3_BHEN_Gorillapod_SLR_Zoom_Flexible_Mini.html
While this is no substitute for a fluid head tripod as it would not be very smooth for panning, consider the bendable legs that can attach to a fence or other pole to place the camera where a tripod would not fit. I have attach this to my car door to get some great tracking shots. Also, I have found that by bending the rear legs up to make a bicycle like handle bar and use the front leg as a balance or pivot point, you can really have some very smooth handheld shots with it. The key here is to get one that is heavy enough to support your camera. I am using my Joby with a pocket camera that weighs in at about 7.6 oz. (214g) while the tripod can support nearly 7 pounds so it is very stable. Your Nikon D7000 with a lens is going to be more than 2 maybe 3 pounds so you might want a heavier Joby.
I realize the following is out of your budget and mine too but if you are looking for really smooth dolly shots especially for product shots or small scale shooting consider this modified version of the JOBY invented by an MIT engineering student:
http://cinetics.com/