I wonder what fraction of the typical working day is spent working to earn the money to pay for the car to get to work?

the thing is that’s a massively variable cost isn’t it?

Some people buy brand new cars outright
Some people buy new cars with loans/finance
Some people lease new cars
Some people buy older cars outright
Some people buy even older cars for peanuts

So the whole “how mush per year does your car cost” question is always going to get wildly different answers.

The cost per year of not using a £30,000 car is different to the cost of not using a £500 car, even though the ongoing running costs like fuel/insurance/tyres could be the same between the two of them.

Not to mention that your age/circumstances can mean that insurance can vary by a factor of 10, which skews the ‘fixed cost’ bit even more.

I think looking at it financially is a non-starter as the only way you can do that is in an individual basis, and even if you can prove one way or the other is actually £ for £ cheaper (for your specific case) you have to factor in the ephemeral ‘value’ of convenience and how much that is worth to you.

Not to mention that someone who can afford it and is spending loads makes the same impact as someone who is struggling and running on a tight budget if they both reduce their use in the same way where appropriate.

For me, I was luckily already able to afford running two cars, but the benefits I’ve had from reducing my use have been in reduced stress, reduced time wasted, improved health and financial.

The benefits to everyone else of me not using my car as much have mostly been environmental and not financial.

Better to just look overall at your situation and make the best choices for you and your situation, money is one aspect of that but not all, don;t get hung up on it too much.

In terms of cutting down – I have over the last 12 months.

I changed jobs this time last year. At my old job I had free parking. I cycled three or four days per week and drove one or two. I now work next door but have to pay for parking. I’ve driven twice in 12 months.

I’d always assumed £1,500 or so per year, let’s see

Insurance £700
VED £280
Annual service, MOT and a couple of ‘bits’ each year £450 (this is a complete guess)
RAC £167 (covers motorbike too though)

Park on drive so no parking charges

£1,500 wasn’t a mile off, but lets see the other stuff

We do very low mileage, so tyres and consumables don’t come up much, max of around 5,000 per year including week long family holiday in the car.
Car does around 23mpg (uber conservative estimate, stop start local driving mainly), so at £1.13 a litre that’s about £1,100 in fuel

So around £1,600 in running costs, £2,700 including fuel

I reckon the car will depreciate around £1,000 per year as a minimum too. Lets say £1,300 to make the maths easier

So £4k per year to do 5k miles, which works out at 80p a mile total cost. Price per mile would go down if we did more miles though (to a point, as consumables would go up)

Okay my car cost about £5.5k a year and a half ago, if anyone wants to calculate the depreciation of a now 8.5year old Mondeo batter in. Couple of hundred quid, if that? I call it a sunk cost. That’s what its worth to me and it’ll probably run until it either gets too expensive to fix or I have a compelling reason to get shot of it.

I used to live in London and cycle everywhere and didn’t need a car at all.

But then I ..
1. Moved out of London
2. Moved in with OH
3. Got caught up in Southern train strike fiasco
4. Had a baby

Now we have 2 cars and need them both! One of them is a 1.0 Toyota IQ which is v. cheap to run tho.

Current house: 100% reliant on the car as we’re miles from anywhere

House by the beach: Could probably do without 95% of the time as we’re within 5 mins walk of the village shops/pubs plus there’s plenty of taxis and a bus service.
When we go there we unpack the car and generally don’t touch it again until we go home – this can include stays of 4-5 weeks.

For day to day stuff not much. Local shops, plus supermarket delivery. Wife works in the local school around the corner. I cycle to work three days a week.

Car mostly gets used for long journeys to visit friends and relatives and by me for visiting customers now and again. At a guess the cost of the train for a family of five would be more expensive and less flexible than the car.

I would say we are very dependant upon our car. I am a paramedic and pre pregnancy my station was only 3 miles away however I have to be at work at 0530 and I am not a morning person so use a car to get there for day shifts, night shifts I cycle. Since iv been pregnant they have moved me to the control room which is 30 miles each way and no public transport to get there for the 7am start time. My other half is a lorry driver and his depot is about 6 miles away, he usually has to be in work by 430am and usually works a 12-15 hour day, he rides a motorbike to work. We did have two cars but I was hit by an uninsured driver 18 months ago and my car was written off, I still don’t have my own car because I am still waiting for the MIB to deal with my case. We would be struggling if he did not have his motorbike. We also need the car to go to my maternity appointments, we could get to the local one on public transport and it wouldn’t take too long but there have been some problems with the baby and some of our appointments are over in Bristol with specialists. Again no car and it would be hard for us to go to these appointments. They have built an asda walking distance where we live, I tend to walk to do the shopping unless there is going to be too much for me to realistically carry. We have three dogs who currently are mostly having local walks but need the car to get them to the vets. Once our son is born I think we will be even more dependant on the car, he may or may not be disabled we won’t know until awhile after he is born, nor do we know to what severity we only have probabilities. We will have to go to see the specialists every 3 months after he is born for tests during his first year. There is the chance he may never be able to sit unaided let alone walk so will need a car to transport him once he is too big to be carried. I am currently trying to convince my partner to get one of the thule chariot trailers so I can retain a degree of freedom as he will probably take the car most days once I’m on maternity leave. It would be nice to be able to go jogging with the baby and later cycling. Once I return to work I will definitely need a car as I will be essentially working as relief and could be sent anywhere within an hours drive for my shifts. I will also need to take our son to Bristol before work to be cared for by my parents as there are no child care options that cover 12 hour shifts, especially at the hours we would need.

I could manage just fine without a car I cycle to work and have good public transport links from end of the road. I have 2 cars to go and do fun stuff that’s not local. Or just to go to work when I’m feeling lazy.

Handed back my company car 4 years ago. One of the best things I ever did. Wife has a small car that we use if necessary, but we only do about 3500 miles a year in it.

I wonder what fraction of the typical working day is spent working to earn the money to pay for the car to get to work?

For me, including all purchase and running costs it would be 0% of my working day. 😆

Living in a rural area with 1 bus a day to one of three towns (all a 20min drive away), very.
I work from home and run the village shop and much of our stock is local which I collect. With out a working vehicle it would be very difficult (not impossible) too keep the shop.

On the plus side, I’ve access to loads of trails, the nearest is 50yards from my front door and it’s possible to do a 30ish mile loop with about 90% off road.

Its not virtue signalling or anything else to describe to the OP MY lifestyle that means I can live happily without a car.

Its all about the choices you make.

Nice to see a couple of folk actually being honest about how much their cars cost them. Most folk are willfully blind over this. £3000 – 4000 a year is around the true cost to the owner of car ownership – of course if car drivers actually paid the fullcost to society of car ownership without massive subsidy from general taxationm it would be a lot more

whitestone – Member

Given people’s stated reliance, how much does anyone think they could reduce it by? Perhaps a better or more realistic approach than assuming that reduction == prohibition.

Could you maintain something close to your current lifestyle if, for example, you were only permitted ten car journeys per week? We’ll dutifully avoid practicalities like “how would it be enforced?”, let’s just assume for the discussion that it could be.

I could cycle to work a bit more often, but realistically, i couldn’t do much else than that to lower my use.

I currently am only reliant on my car for weekend transportation.

I commute weekly by air so could get a taxi rather than drive to the airport. At the weekends I tend to use the car to get to where the good trails are. I used to drive over 20k miles a year now it is I guess under 10k.

I could reduce my personal car usage to zero by using taxi’s and not riding my bike in nice places at the weekend. This is not going to happen because it would make my life miserable and I don’t have to.

I make my annual cost about £3k so that’s about right. For balance though how much is public transport subsidised? Those buses and trains don’t run on hopes and dreams.

Its all about the choices you make.

Yep, I chose to live rurally and because of that I need a car.

When I first moved I didn’t but then the 07:15, 08:00 and 09:00 buses were all removed with only bus now being at 11:00. So I guess other people make choices for me too….

We do about 8000 miles a year in our car.

We both work quite locally so bike/ walk to work most days; although occasionally we drive part way then walk. We try to get the kids to school and nursery by cycling/ walking most days. I took the youngest to today on a child seat and on Tuesday I took the eldest to school on the tagalong.

We try to have a car free day every week; sometimes its 2 or 3 days a week.

I consciously try not to use the car too much, but its not always possible. One thing I find quite sad is people driving kids to school/ nursery when they live less than a mile or two away. We have people on our road for example who are work at home/ stay at home parents and they drive their kids to school.

The other thing that annoys me is virtually all traffic jams are made up of single occupancy vehicles; long-term there needs to be some kind of shift away from this, but I’m not sure how.

Our car costs are this; cost £8k (7 years old now), tax £15 p/m, fuel £55 to 75 p/m + mot/ service (£150 to 250).

As my car bit the dust 2 days ago, I can say VERY. I had planned to run my car through til at least spring/early summer next year.

I live 20 (motorway) miles from work, and she works similar in the opposite direction. I do have the option of a train about 15/20 mins walk from home and 35 mins walk from work, but she doesn’t. I have done it on a bike once but my FS with nobblies isn’t really a commuter and the roads aren’t that nice. Last half is canal path though with only one mucky part.

Luckily for me my 6 mths pregnant partner just upgraded her car and we still hadn’t sold her old one. I’m taking that on and going to run that through til sometime early/mid next year.

Also luckily I (now) get roughly fixed bonus every six months, plus sometimes extra at christmas. First one due at the end of this month.

Had this been 3 months ago when my financial situation was less certain I’d have fixed the car (which costs more than its value). But as I’ve got the bonus’s coming (and had a pay raise) I’m grateful to be in a more flexible position.

So I’ve made the decision to a) not fix my car as repairs cost more than its worth b) not spend what i do have (about 2/3rds towards the car I want once the bonus comes in) and stick with a known quantity and proceed roughly as previously planned, just with a different car.

of course, its very important for me to have a car because I live on the coast away from any hills and drive to them to ride 🙂

id say not at all. ish…

we both live and work about 3 miles away. Its great. Still drive…. in seperate cars!!!

the issue is if i need to pop out somewhere i can. If i want to go to a trail center i can. when we only had one car we had to make a choice and i lost.

tjagain – Member
I have however made decisions in my life that mean this works for me. turning down jobs that were too far from my house to cycle to

That’s not strictly true though, there was the time when you worked at a nursing home in Tranent and commuted by motorbike. Then you bought a scooter for commuting.