Should I consider?

I've been out a car for about a year now which really sucks seeing as how thats pretty much my entire senior year of high school. I had a bad accident and totaled a perfectly good truck, and then bought the worst lemon known to man.

Now that I've got some cash again... I found a 1999 Cougar at a dealer near my house. 145k miles on it, i feel that it's in pretty solid shape. It's the 2.5l v6 24v version and I test drove it, thought it felt nice.

The question is how reliable are these cars? Should I spend 4 grand on this one? And When not driving but just parked idle theres some ticking noise with the engine which I thought might a valve ticking, but I looked up cougars of the same year and engine on youtube and they made it too so is that normal?

Thanks a bunch for any sincere advice :)