What does your car cost you?

**lgslgs** · 03-07-2008, 08:43 AM

Originally posted by LivingAlmostLarge View Post

I was thinking if we sold one car, we'd save $200/month. Is this worth it? We would also pocket $3k.

I wonder if it's worth it? Basically we're paying for the conveince of have two cars $200/month. Actually it's likely $150, because insurance wouldn't go down by half because of 2 drivers on 1 car isn't that much cheaper. In MA, insurance is regulated by the state and it's not car based but driver based. It's a horrible system.

So is it worth selling to save $150/month? Have you considered what your car costs you?

We consider this every year, since we have two paid for cars and last year only drove 1585.4 miles between them (down from 1907.2 miles in 2006).

The only reason we keep both vehicles is because we have 3 dogs, 8 goats and a cow, and every year we've had a veterinary emergency of some sort. We can't take the chance of not having a back-up vehicle in case of a dead battery on one or a vet emergency when one vehicle is at the mechanic's.

If is was just us and no animals I'd get rid of the second vehicle. The amount we'd save each year would easily buy several cab rides to town or an emergency amubulance trip if needed.

Too bad there's no option like that for when you've got a goat with a broken leg!

Lynda

**ceejay74** · 03-07-2008, 08:59 AM

Why don't you try leaving one car in the garage for a month, and see whether it causes a big strain on your lifestyle? If it does, go back to the 2-car system knowing it's worth it. If it's no big deal, sell the 2nd car!

**atomicrc11** · 03-07-2008, 09:01 AM

I'm also in MA and our family shares 1 car. I drive it every day to work because my job is outside of Boston about 30 miles. I spend $40/month on car insurance, $200 on gas, and $100 in tolls. I don't know if you have the advantage of the T, but my wife uses it exclusively and it only costs us $59/month to go anywhere in the city. Add in some cab rides, about $30 of me using the T every month, and we're still ahead of where we would be with a 2nd car.

Also to our advantage, when we sold the 2nd car, it was about time to buy a new one anyway, so we avoided buying a new(new to us) car, insurance of about $50 more/month, $100 in gas per month, $200 in parking while my wife it at work and maintenance. If you have it available, Zipcar is quite good as a backup. It costs $50/year plus from $7-11$/hour to rent a car including gas and insurance. We each have a card so that if the other has the car, we can always rent one. Car sharing is a pretty cool alternative to a 2nd car.

**project15** · 03-07-2008, 09:34 AM

2003 VW GTI per month:
Loan - 267.51
Insurance - 83.86
Gas - 90
Maintenance - 50

2005 Mazda3 per month:
Lease - 250
Insurance - 61.48
Gas - 90
Maintenance - 50

Total per month for 2 cars: 942.85

It's worth it though. The cars will be paid off soon (1-2 yrs) and the insurance will drop some then and we'll have two good condition cars paid off.

**LivingAlmostLarge** · 03-07-2008, 09:35 AM

We live outside the city and I use the car to get to public transit. I could wait for a bus to get there but it would add on extra time. And then buying a combo pass would be more expensive. It would eat into the $150/month it costs. Combo I believe is $100/month. So it would cost me like $100/month to go to public transit.

**momof1in150** · 03-07-2008, 09:37 AM

Total per month:

Touareg Payment - $654
99 Golf - paid (less the 75K miles on it)
Gas (two cars) - $230
Insurance - $96
Repairs - rare but I will put $75 to average out the year

$1055

Yearly - $12600 (inspections & registration are every other year so that would add $100 a year average)

**Caoineag** · 03-07-2008, 09:47 AM

Every once and awhile I contemplate the costs of owning a car because I do know its very convenient (which goes into the con category of owning a car for me). My math suggests that LivingAlmostLarge would be similar to my own if I owned one and I just can't justify that kind of expenditure.

Here is what my transportation costs me:
$60 for DH's bus pass
$0 for my bus pass (works buys this for me in lieu of a parking pass)
$30-50 for renting a car for a weekend on those occasions we need one. Haven't needed to do this in over 6 months.
$20 for gas for car rental when we get one.

I really thought DH would want a car once we got our debts under control but after a couple of years of this, he really isn't interested in one either.

**Snave** · 03-07-2008, 10:12 AM

Both of our cars are paid for at this time. I get an allowance for my car from my company as I travel quite a bit. However, I paid off the loan on the car the first year, so my "allowance" goes to the bank. I do have to pay for insurance and maintainance on the car, so that runs around $1500 a year total. My gas is paid for. My wife's car is also paid for and she uses about $125 a month in gas - fills up every 10 days or so. With gas + insurance + maintainance, hers runs a $2500 for the year or so.

**Joan.of.the.Arch** · 03-07-2008, 10:43 AM

I have been avoiding totaling it up. I do want to increase our liability insurance because we have a bare minimum, and as a recent thread here pointed out, those minimums can be exceeded quickly in an accident.

What does the IRS currently allow for "mileage"?

**atomicrc11** · 03-07-2008, 11:14 AM

The monthly link pass for local bus and subway is $59, inner express bus plus local bus and subway is $89, the outer express plus the rest is $129. Depending on what is available to you and where you are coming from it may or may not make sense. What station do you travel to and how far is it?

Also, check with your company, as I know with ours using ADP Flex direct, I can take up to $110 pre-tax and put it onto a Visa Debit card to use for mass transit. You can also put more post-tax onto the card so you can zero it out every month. Plus up to $750 per person can be deducted for Tolls and Mass transit expenses from the commonwealth taxes.

**momof1in150** · 03-07-2008, 11:21 AM

Originally posted by Joan.of.the.Arch View Post

I have been avoiding totaling it up. I do want to increase our liability insurance because we have a bare minimum, and as a recent thread here pointed out, those minimums can be exceeded quickly in an accident.

What does the IRS currently allow for "mileage"?

It depends on what the mileage is for:

Standard Mileage Rates

**jc3900** · 03-07-2008, 11:59 AM

NONE! Right now my current responsibilities as relates to the car is 0. My parents cover everything for me. That will probably change in about 2 years and I think then I will have to olook into getting a 4000$ car or something. But until then, life is great!

**InDebtInDC** · 03-07-2008, 12:17 PM

For me, safety and reliability are my highest concerns above all because safety always comes first, and reliablity is strongly related to safety (being stuck in the middle of a bad neighbordhood at night).

To be honest, I have a really difficult time being in a small car (I have a full size pickup truck for those who don't know).

A lot of people drive recklessly and most of them have not had adequate training for the type of driving they want to do.

I pay easily more than both of your cars combined, but I don't care so much about how much the car costs me as long as the occupants are safe in case of a collision.

Being injured and out of work for a long time when you get rammed by 3 trucks and your car gets total'ed like mine was really puts the monthly savings in perspective. All 3 of them drove away. My Corolla was total'ed and I was out for the better part of 3 months.

It took many years to settle the case and I was having to foot the bills in between.

I don't think I'm being paranoid. We have the third highest traffic congestion in the country and equally the highest in terms of careless drivers.

**LivingAlmostLarge** · 03-07-2008, 12:59 PM

I live out where I know what my pass will cost. And as a student I don't get a tax break for the pass write off. I don't have an "employer". DH gets a parking pass so he drives to work.

I forgot to add in extra costs if we kept only one car and had to repair it more. I am not sure what the best deal is.

I guess I fall into the category of most people. I think the problem is that having a second, cheap paid for car, makes it hard to give up, knowing that we would have to go back to a two car family in the next 2 years.

And we've had two cars since we meet (bought before we meet each other), and there was no way in CA, we could live with one car. So we needed 2 cars until we moved out. But then when we moved east, we considered giving it up, but our cars were worth $4k. And the likleyhood of needing a second car when a baby came was likely.

I am assuming we're not changing cars with a kid.

What does your car cost you?