This is where guitars are right now.
Both Fender and Gibson are now owned by venture capitalists. Their quality of everything, from strings to picks to guitars, has plummeted across every brand they own in the last five years. It’s sad really.
You go on Reddit and people talk about the models and which one is great for this, or why they prefer it for that, but then you find some deeper dives into more recent spaces and people who know what they are talking about have moved away entirely from both brands.
If anyone is curious, you can buy a better guitar from Harley-Benton, Cort, or Jet than from Fender/Gibson and it will be 1/2 to 1/4 the cost.
Did you like building your own? I have a used PRS SE 24, which I got for a steal due to paint scuffs, but thought about building my own.