I wouldn't spend that kind of money to fix it. I'm hoping you got more than one estimate for all this work. Dealers are fairly expensive for this kind of service, and it's not like your car is so unusual that a good independent mechanic couldn't fix what's wrong. Go get estimates from local independent mechanics you or your friends and coworkers trust (e.g., not Sears or CarX). That technician also should be able to tell you what else you may be spending money on soon. Then you can decide.

If you have to, just fix the obvious safety issues (like the tie rods) and start car-shopping. Four grand can buy you a car like a Ford Contour or a Pontiac Grand Prix or a Plymouth Breeze or such with less than 100,000 miles on it; assuming it's been cared-for, it should be good for another 50,000. The car might be a little older than yours, but if it has much lower mileage and it has maintenance records, it could work.

No question about it. Not worth fixing by any stretch of the imagination. There maybe cheeper places to get it fixed but imo unless you could to the repairs yourself, no shop could do a good job at a price that would make it worth doing.

If you're not picky about make or model, spend $2500 or more on something that's not the most stylish thing on the road, but not falling appart. Do a little research on the car you want to buy to avoid great looking cars that have known serious defects. 1993-ish Ford Tauris for example has a junk box automatic transmission. You could find a perfect shape one of those with 80k miles on it real cheep. Down side is the tranny has about a 99% chance of failing before it gets to 90k miles. Then you get to spend more on the tranny than you paid for the whole car...and still have a junk box transmission that will quit early. You can still find something to get you by for $2500 or so imo.