People ask themselves this question regularly, and not just about cars. Unless you have control of your finances there is no way to tell. You have to know how much your income is and how much your bills and expenses are to find out if you have enough left over for any purchase.

The only way to accomplish this is to have a budget in place. Your budget has to be as accurate as possible and include money for your long and short term savings. All of these things must be considered before you can determine if you can afford to buy anything.

The best way to start is to determine how much disposable income you have. You do this by only using your take home pay plus any other income you may have after any deductions.

The next step is to put down on paper all of your reoccurring bills such as your house payment or rent, utilities, phone, internet costs, car payments, insurance, etc. These are fairly simple to determine, however, you will have to estimate bills that do not have a constant payment each month like your electric bill.

In my 25 to 30 years working with personal money management problems I have never seen worry help solve problem. In fact it has just opposite effect.

Worry clouds your judgment. You have certain actions that you need to take to get your problems solved and you will need a clear head to make necessary decisions.

In some cases worry leads to desperation and is used as an excuse not to face problem.

Let me say this in explicit terms "No one dies of starvation or goes to jail because they can't pay their bills in this country". I understand that there have been people starve to death in US but that was more than likely an extreme situation. Also, if there is anyone that goes to jail because of their debts you can bet there was fraud involved.

Even if you don't have any income at all there are places to turn. Worrying is not going to make things happen.

The best thing you can do to get started solving your money problems, after you stop worrying about it, is to access your situation. You have to look at it as if you are an outsider looking in.

Find out exactly what problem is. This is easier than you think. Here are a few of most common problems that are causing your worries:

Credit Card Debt Medical Bills Impulse Spending Mortgage Payment or Rent too high Absence of a Budget Unorganized Bills and Files Late Payments & Fees Overdraft Fees Not Prioritizing Spending

If you have your spending set up by category it won't take long to see where problem is. Here is an example: