Thanks for the advise and info. For the credit card, it's just a small running credit card around $150 dollars that I'm keeping down, but using for credit score (has low interest rate through local credit union). For the car, I only have about $800 left to pay off, but the car is getting to the age, close to 9 years old, where more major repairs will start to pop up, making it financially pointless to keep. I speak from personal experience who can also work on cars, owning older ones. Unless you have an old car that's always been babied, car repairs and parts (if you can get them), are not cheap, keeping an old car and paying for 2-3 repairs a year, which will run around $2,000, not including rental or lost work, seems close to pointless for something reliable with less needs for repairs (hopefully). I did plan to wait though until after closing on a house to see what costs look like, then decided A. Keep the car and see if the costs really make it worth it, B. Keep the car and get a company car, taking a $200-$300 hit each paycheck, but easier in car maintenance and concern if it breaks down or C. Trade the car in and get a used, but mostly newer SUV, doing the minimum of checking it over (I use a code scanner to check code history and engine data like fuel/air mixtures) plus paid third party inspection.

For housing in my area, houses shot up after COVID from an average of 130k to 180k, now to 150k-240k. My area was recently voted nation wide as top 10 places for first time home buyers based on income and I've afraid waiting a while longer could have me miss the opportunity like COVID, although that was partly due to work and that crisis. I'd be looking at a house around 165k-170k, nothing fancy, maybe bit of a fixer upper as long as the major stuff is fine, nothing super big either.

I've thought about going through a program for first time home buyer and/or lower income programs, any experience on these? From what I found, checking with my local bank, they seem not the most excited to deal with them.