(Not advice for cgod, just adding to your point)

Never bought a new guitar in my life, and am currently making music with an electric guitar that the music store near me (Trade Up) threw in for free with my $20 amp. My gear apart from that is a $25 banjo, a bass that was given to me, and the same $100 acoustic guitar I've had for 10 years.

I've never given a fuck about gear, because "tone" is about a dozen orders of magnitude less important than composition and performance to me. It's a hell of a lot easier to get good tone than to write a decent song or put on a good show. Fuck the cult of tone - unless you make music that is largely textural, like noise rock, it just doesn't matter that much if you aren't doing big shows.

Get thee to a pawn shop. Buy a guitar that isn't broken, learn how to solder a shitty pickup, and find the right strings for your guitar and your music. Really can't overemphasize that last point. A set of strings is going to set you back $5 - if you want to sound good and stay in tune, buy a new set every week or two.