I (college student) have a 2011 Subaru Forester with 159,000 miles on it. I bought it about a year and a half ago and it has given me nothing but stress ever since. I bought it for around $5,500 after totaling my previous ancient car (RIP my beloved PT Cruiser) and only a year after buying it the engine crapped out. It was in the middle of a really important summer internship where I was driving long distances (35-40 minutes one way) almost every day and we didn't have the time or money to buy a new used car so my parents decided to replace the engine. We paid $5000 for a new radiator and a used engine with 50k miles with a 6 month warranty on all the work done on it. It was a rough choice to make, but it happened and now I'm here.

A month or so afterwards my check engine light comes on while driving on 95 with a PO420 code. After some investigation we replaced the oxygen sensors and the light went off. Fast forward to now, a month or so later, and the car intermittently won't start. First it doesn't start, so I jumped it and took it to a battery place to get the battery and starter tested. They couldn't find anything wrong but the car still wouldn't start even with jumping it. The next day I went back and it started fine, but starts making this screechy whirring sound coming from one of the belts. I drove it back to school that day and a few days later took it to another place to get the problem diagnosed. Of course this time the car starts perfectly fine, no whirring or anything. The car place can't duplicate the issue or figure out what's wrong but recommended the front bushings get repaired (which is fair, they're pretty messed up), a battery replacement (though they said it's not an urgent issue), and replacing the belt and tensioner to try and fix the issue. They recommended some other small fixes like fluid replacements (brake fluid, transmission fluid, engine oil, coolant exchange, and front and rear differential fluids all except the engine oil due by mileage), replacing the spark plugs, fixing a minor AC leak, and something about the exhaust (they wrote "rust flanges not leaking"?) all of which I can't afford to worry about right now. They also said that my tires were dry rotted, which I'm absolutely sure is wrong but the woman also made some questionable comments about avoiding buying Subaru, Honda, or Mazda cars in general so I don't know how much I trust their opinion at this point. I'm driving the car home from college tomorrow so my parents can help fix some of these issues and save some money.

Basically, after fixing those three things, do I sell the car or try to fix the current problem and hope something else doesn't pop up next? I don't trust this car anymore and I'm just tired of losing money to this thing. I would love to just fix it and keep driving it but I can't help but think I'm just gonna always be fixing the next problem and losing money. Keep in mind, I can't afford to get another car unless I can reasonably get more than like $5500 at the very least for this car and that's with taking out a car payment. None of this is ideal but I just don't know what to do anymore. Should I cut my losses or keep trying? Help!!