If you are just now beginning to think you might need a wheelchair, you are possibly already weeks or months past actually needing one. Many of us have/had put it off longer than we should have. And I'll bet there's only one or two who might regret having purchased one when they did.

You are a wise person. A few months ago I wrote a column called "How to know when you need a wheelchair." It should be somewhere in the index under "Humor" if you want to look under that headline and I tried to use some humor to explain when is the proper time to get a wheelchair for you.

Shop around and if you aren't familiar with them, go to a pharmacy that sells medical equipment and let them help explain it to you. Then talk with your doctor, your friends and neighbors, whoever and look around online for the best price you can find where the size and weight of chair that has the features you want. Keep in mind if you're going to be moving to chair yourself in and out of the car it's going to need to be what's called a light weight chair or even a super lightweight, however the lighter weight the chair the more money it is typically seems to cost but it will be a good investment.
If you go on to need a power chair then having a good manual chair will be an excellent backup in case of repairs being needed to the power chair. A good manual chair will probably run you anywhere between 400 and 800 or 900 dollars depending on what your budget budget allows.
Good luck.