expenses with owning a car: overview, summary at end...
gasoline:
it cost americans an average of $368.09 to purchase gasoline during april 2011, compared to just $174.80 during april 2009. the same article reporting that figure also stated that, "nationally, about 8.87 percent of the average household income was spent on fuel purchases." and that was considering that the median household income is $49,777. shout out, everyone who makes less than 49g per year say "hey!" i make less than half of that, which would mean if i drove an average amount to the tune of $368, i would be spending more like 19% of my total income just on gas. in fact, i spent $320 on gas in april, pretty close to the average. and i only spend that much now that i live in the middle of nowhere. last year i probably spent $368 for the entire year. figure this: over the course of a year, $368 comes to $4416! and this is only for gasoline, of course, just but one factor of an auto expense.
insurance:
according to carinsurance.com, here in oregon, the average cost of car insurace is $1185.35 per year, which is 8% lower than the national average somewhat lower than the national average of $1440.34 (unless you live in portland where it is $1518.19). so, if you make that rosy $49g per year, then you would be paying 2.4% of your money to car insurance. now, in human terms, i drive a bucket which is worth about a nickel and carry the bare minimum required by law, which basically means i am paying money but am not really covered. i still pay 2.2% of my salary on auto insurance.
registration:
here in oregon, if you are just renewing tags, basic cars and trucks cost $86 for two years (except multinomah county where the cost is $105). of course if you are just registering your car for the first time, there is the $77 fee to get the license plates. just don't buy a special kind because that is more money everytime you register/renew. the simple cost of registration would then be $43 per year.
property taxes:
don't go buying any car which would save the environment! the article i just read shows that oregon residents would be adding an extra cent and half per mile by driving electric vehicles, if the proposed house bill 2328 is successful. now if we take away the gas tax and start charging per mile instead of the "ev tax", this might be a bit more fair to electric car owners. of course, there would probably be charges per mile in addition to "ev tax" but that is an entirely different debate. oregonians are already lucky in that automobiles are not considered "real property," which means we don't pay property tax on them. i wouldn't anyway because i drive a bucket with no value. and we are lucky in that we don't have inspection or emissions requirements to add to taxes and repair costs. potential such taxes would be dependent on the state and county in which you live. so, to make things simple, this blog is based on union county, oregon.
car payment:
except for a short time in the late 90s, i have never had a car payment. but a quick survey of my friends (none of whom make 49k per year), showed an average payment of$300.60 per month. the guru dave ramsey said last year that the average american pays $475.
maintenace:
a quote on this docstoc page covering the hidden costs of car ownership, says that an average car costs $650 per year in upkeep. i would guess higher, but that's because i drive a jalopy that is break down prone, my car required a little more than $1500 last year. for the sake of a nice round number, i will assume the "average" person pays $650.
parking:
more fees that are heavily dependent on how much you want to pay, where you are going, where you live work, etcetera. i don't pay for parking ever. of course this means that i sometimes get tickets, which cost me a total of $85 last year. still that is cheap when considering that a parking pass at the university of oregon costs$300 or more per quarter. at that rate, i'll just continue to pay parking tickets. i did probably pay about $20 or so to feed meters. average numbers on this category were tough to find. across america, the average person paid $153.19 per month back in 2006, acoording to this msn article. $887 per month in manhattan? no thanks, i wouldn't even pay $20 per month in memphis. so, even this dated information tells me the average american spends $1838.29 per year to park their car. rediculous. that's more than i net in the month, after taxes!!
.....................average person / cheapskate yoshida
annual wage................$49,777* / $23,000
gasoline......................$4416 / $3840
insurance.....................$1185 / $500
registration....................$43 / $43
property taxes.................. $0 / yeah right
maintenace.....................$650 / $1500
loan payments..................$475 / never
parking.......................$1838 / $105
total per year................$8607 / $5988
percent of total income..........17 / 26
* i am not sure i know one person who makes $49,777 per year, so my peeps really get screwed on this. and, for a lot of people, my own wage is a lot of money. but it's hard to have less car expense than i pay. so, if someone works at walmart and has to drive a car to get there, that would be literally paying with their life.
go figure! the average person spends 17% of their income on their car? that is, supposing the average person makes so much bank. if someone works for $8 per hour and has the normal car expense, they pay 52% of total income. worse yet, i spend 26%? that is unfathomable. just think about this way... the average "making bank" person, at 17%, could afford to take 62 extra days off work per year - two months! if a person works at walmart, they could take a half year off work per year! and me, i am considering putting in for 93 days of unpaid leave next year. sorry, boss, i am just gonna take the summer off.
and if all of this isn't enough, things like travel time, citations and accidents are other factors not even considered here. like how much in psychiatrist fees i have to pay to deal with traffic.
and how much does being out of shape cost? ever consider how much time does a person have to take off work because they get sick easily for being out of shape? get rid of your car, get exercise, save money, go to work less, live longer, feel better, save the environment. i mean, it makes so much sense, i am not really sure why everyone has a freaking car.
here are a couple other interesting sites related to life sans car:
living large without a car, link seems somewhat dead to me, but you can search the site it takes you to for "living large without a car"...
calculator for how much it costs to drive a car
aaa stats at pierce transit, which i used to ride a ton
visual economics: shows a breakdown of how much we spend on what, including 17.6% on transportation
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