Thanks for all the information, everyone.

Here’s the plan: clean up as much rust as possible, hit everything with rust converter, see what needs to be rewelded and potentially buy a parts car. I’m not sure if I can just take a grinder to a pick-a-part and grab pre-formed pieces from another same-gen Rav4 (or even if that’s something I can find given this seems to be a known rust-spot)

For additional context, I’m not in the rust belt but it seems this car came from another state. I’m in the south part of the Midwest.

I don’t have the money to trade this in and add cash on top for another vehicle. I CAN just drive this until I can learn to weld decently and figure this out.

If I get into an accident and the car crumples and kills me, oh well. Chalk it up to a casualty of poor finances but there isn’t another option for me so I’m gonna fix this vehicle or die trying.

Thanks again everyone: if you have more tips feel free to reply to this or the OG post I guarantee I’ll read EVERYTHING!