FWIW, (not much!), I like to buy $100-$200 of pyusd every month because there is no fee. I then let it sit there earning "interest" while the hold time for each purchase ticks down. That way there are always funds available when a "deal" comes along. This is the cheapest on-boarding method from fiat currency I'm aware of.
I've noticed recently more vendors and GBs are taking pyusd directly, usually on the ETH chain but sometimes on SOL (which is better fee-wise). So that's nice to see.
I've been doing crypto a long time too, so I transfer my pyusd to Atomic Wallet which is what I've used for years--even though it is kind of sucky, it's familiar. If I'm doing stuff on the Solana chain I use Phantom in the browser.
When I need to convert to a specific stablecoin (usually USDT) or coins for gas, I use swapzone.io and search for a good exchange rate. I never hear swapzone discussed in these forums but it's worked well for me.
I have a Coinbase account but don't use it for much of anything these days.
I record every transaction and any fees paid in a tab in my big household finance spreadsheet so I have that info for taxes, which I'm dreading having to deal with for the first time this year, since PP and Coinbase are now ratting us out the US Government. But hopefully it won't too awful since I'm not speculating in BTC and just making purchases/donations. (I've explored places on TOR to buy coin without NYC procedures, but too much hassle for me for this.)