How much house can you afford? Knowing you want to buy a home is one thing; knowing how much of a mortgage payment you can handle is quite another. Too often, dreams and reality collide: You’re yearning for a four-bedroom Colonial, but given your income and debt owed to credit cards and beyond, the best monthly loan payment you can manage is for a two-bedroom bungalow in a sketchy party of town.

So how do you pinpoint a house where the monthly mortgage payment is financially within your reach, and one that won’t drive you deep into debt? Allow us to help you paint your payment profile picture and find that magic number.

Why your mortgage payment depends on your income

Getting a ballpark estimate of how much house you can afford starts with looking at your income, or how much money you’re pulling in.

“The general rule of thumb is that you can purchase a home that costs two or three times your annual income,” says Harrine Freeman, a financial expert and the owner of H.E. Freeman Enterprises.

So if you’re earning $80,000 per year (and you have a reasonable amount of job security and don’t expect wild fluctuations in your income anytime soon), you can afford a house up to three times that, or $240,000.