How can I best upgrade basic to smartphone

Question

I see lots of conflicting posts about upgrading and keeping a basic plan. 
I have 3 basic phones an a shareplan 700 that is long past it's 2 yr contract and only one phone uses text, for which I pay extra for limited texts.
I qualify for upgrading all three phones under what was called upgrade every 2 yrs.
Is it really possible to keep the shareplan 700 and upgrade to 2 smartphones and pay for an add-on data plan for $30/1GB?
And adding on the data is advertised as shareable across all devices.  Does that mean devices in the account, specifically
2 smartphones?  Or does it mean devices other than a smartphone?
If it is possible then do I understand correctly that first I add-on data option to the account and then upgrade the phones?  And when I do this exactly how do I make sure I don't get switched to the new style plan?
thanks

Answer 1

I'm assuming your keeping one basic phone and want 2 smartphones. Under the 700 minute plan pricing that should be $60 for the first line $10 each for 2 lines total $80. The you'd have to get two 2 GB data plans at $30 each. That's $60. So that would be $140 plus whatever your current texting plan costs( you didn't say ). Plus taxes/fees. No sharing of data.
Under Share Everything you'd have 3 "lines access" charges two $40 charges for the smartphones, a $30 charge for a basic phone so a total of $110. 1 GB of data would be $50 so a total of $160 plus taxes/fees. Minutes and texting would be unlimited on all lines. All 3 lines can share the data as well as any device connected via hotspot. Though I would say 1 GB is not nearly enough for 2 smartphones if you plan on using the hotspot feature.