22, living at home and working in a restaurant. IMHO, I think that not taking your advise about paying off and driving that old car and making a financial mistake like that will do two things. One, push him down financially and two, keep him at home a whole lot longer.
Same thing happened to my kids, took a long time to dig out. Kids today have so much more access to information yet appear a lot less knowledgeable about the workings of the real world. Best of luck to the young man.