Hey! Its been a while, I'm sorry, life got in the way! Did some work on the X tho.
Answering
The OP Cooky8 has not been here since Wednesday. Today is Saturday. He or she may not really care.
It might be easier to advize the OP if we had the full stats on the vehicle. Mileage, accident history, condition of the frame, engine condition.
The cost-effective solution could be to junk the 1st generation Xterra and start over with another vehicle. A very high mileage 2nd generation Xterra in otherwise good condition might be a better bet.
It's about 150k miles on it, no idea of the accident history in it frame is rusty on surface but not through, engine works awesomely. I got it for about 1200 us which in our neck of the wood is really cheap for a working 4x4.
Budget is an issue, I ain't got much to patch it and make it whole before winter because I needed it to work. Tho be rid of holes that can fill with ice and do worse damage to it. Took time and about 100 to patch the gaping holes and repaint it all. No it's not professional work and yeah I'm gonna have to re do it later on in its life. But im pretty happy and proud of what we did.
So far I've changed the passenger seatbelts, the electric window motor driver side, the suspension for another stock one but not dead like mine (15$ for the 4) the back bumper for a used but not too rusted one (mine was holding by one side only), filled the holes with urethane expanding foam, recut it, potty with fiberglass, sanded the whole X, did a paintjob with rust preventive paint..
Lot of work and I'm happy and proud of it. No it's not perfect as a body shop would have done. But it's my work.