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You are not accounting for company holidays, personal days, sick days, and those other days you're not driving to work. 45 weeks, maybe. Not 48.
You got the math wrong on total cost. When you go to trade it at 3 years, you have a $15,000 trade on a $30K car. You'd have to know insurance, taxes, registration costs, and the like but that car will cost you about $35,000 to own over 3 years when you trade it.
So I get $43,740 in expenses and $35K in costs assuming 35,000 miles per year. I'm guessing 8,000 of personal use per year.
A twist in this is the tax implications of that mileage reimbursement. The IRS doesn't let you claim mileage going from your home to your place of work so that money is taxable. I don't know your tax bracket or what you have for a state income tax. After the tax bill, it's not a free car but it's awfully close.
It's not taxable if it is mileage reimbursement and if he technically works from home, that is his "office" and he most certainly can count mileage from there to vendor sites or wherever he is traveling. It also sounds like this is a contract position, thus the mileage reimbursement. I also think you might be confusing the tax write of with the reimbursement from his company. From what he said, he's not writing off these costs on his taxes, he is just getting miles reimbursed from his employer. If his employer did not reimburse at the federal rate, he would be able to write off the difference.
It's not taxable if it is mileage reimbursement and if he technically works from home, that is his "office" and he most certainly can count mileage from there to vendor sites or wherever he is traveling. It also sounds like this is a contract position, thus the mileage reimbursement. I also think you might be confusing the tax write of with the reimbursement from his company. From what he said, he's not writing off these costs on his taxes, he is just getting miles reimbursed from his employer. If his employer did not reimburse at the federal rate, he would be able to write off the difference.
OP says four weeks of paid vacation. Sounds more like a regular employee to me.
No tax write off if these are commuting miles and he is an employee.
Addressing the elephant in the room, a commute that is 60 miles one way and on secondary roads means well over two hours per day on the road. It is reasonable to think that after a workday, some of the time the OP will be tired to the point of driving dangerously, or need to have a place near the workplace to sleep.
Personally, I wouldn't do a 60 mile commute. Depending on conditions, the driving skill of the OP, the driving skill of others on the road, and dumb luck, he might expect to have one or two accidents and a significant bump in insurance costs as well as possible injury. Since the driving is to and from work, it is not something that could be recovered from the employer, whereas driving while on the job does place some financial responsibility on the employer.
Addressing the elephant in the room, a commute that is 60 miles one way and on secondary roads means well over two hours per day on the road. It is reasonable to think that after a workday, some of the time the OP will be tired to the point of driving dangerously, or need to have a place near the workplace to sleep.
Personally, I wouldn't do a 60 mile commute. Depending on conditions, the driving skill of the OP, the driving skill of others on the road, and dumb luck, he might expect to have one or two accidents and a significant bump in insurance costs as well as possible injury. Since the driving is to and from work, it is not something that could be recovered from the employer, whereas driving while on the job does place some financial responsibility on the employer.
I am okay with the commute. It is a rural stretch of highway which is mostly empty at all times. The highway takes me straight from my town to the workplace pretty much. Frankly , a 60 mile commute might be above average but the time I will be spending doing it is certainly not. In big cities , it is not uncommon for people to spend 1-1.5 hours commuting from their suburbs to their office on weekdays. The distance might be less but most of the time is spent stuck in traffic ( if commuting in own car ). I have travelled from my hospital to my apartment in Austin in evening traffic and an 8 mile commute took 50 minutes to an hour ( on the I-35 no less ).
I will take a straight empty highway over spending an hour in bumper to bumper traffic anyday.
If I do need to stay near the workplace my employer will reimburse me for those costs also ( per the contract ).
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