100 mile roundtrip commute VS ???? (insurance, vehicle, SUV, fuel)

[homestead123]

So, my current commute is 100 miles round trip an hour each way . I have been making this commute for almost 17 years. My current vehicle gets on average 33 MPG. Its a fairly easy commute highway mostly to the city off hours, so traffic isnt bad.

I just looked at a wear and tear calculator. Geeze! Are those accurate? It says I am spending about $7600/year for a small SUV at 15,000 miles per year. Well I do at least 25,000 miles per year. So almost double.
Am I really spending about $14,000 per year? Can someone explain this?

I can leave my job soon and collect a pension. I am just wondering if it is worth staying on the job longer to increase my pension, or is my commute eating up the difference?

Thanks

[YourWakeUpCall]

A significant portion of a vehicle's operating expense is depreciation, so unless you're driving something that is fully depreciated, the calculators are probably accurate over the lifetime of the car. If the car is more than a few years old, depreciation is less of a factor, so it's costing you much less per mile than the calculators indicate.

[homestead123]

I see. Well It is new or was when I got it in 2018. As was my prior commuter car (small toyota). back in 06'.
I drive my cars into the ground. The toyota went well until 360,000 miles !

[Malloric]

Originally Posted by homestead123

So, my current commute is 100 miles round trip an hour each way . I have been making this commute for almost 17 years. My current vehicle gets on average 33 MPG. Its a fairly easy commute highway mostly to the city off hours, so traffic isnt bad.

I just looked at a wear and tear calculator. Geeze! Are those accurate? It says I am spending about $7600/year for a small SUV at 15,000 miles per year. Well I do at least 25,000 miles per year. So almost double.
Am I really spending about $14,000 per year? Can someone explain this?

I can leave my job soon and collect a pension. I am just wondering if it is worth staying on the job longer to increase my pension, or is my commute eating up the difference?

Thanks

Pretty typical for AAA type calculations. Those are based off buying new and trading in every five years so heavy depreciation hit.

It's a strange question to ask though. Nobody knows if you bought the car used or new, the interest rate on your loan, what your insurance costs, what the repair history is, how long you intend on keeping the vehicle... well, actually you know all those things.

[ncole1]

Originally Posted by homestead123

So, my current commute is 100 miles round trip an hour each way . I have been making this commute for almost 17 years. My current vehicle gets on average 33 MPG. Its a fairly easy commute highway mostly to the city off hours, so traffic isnt bad.

I just looked at a wear and tear calculator. Geeze! Are those accurate? It says I am spending about $7600/year for a small SUV at 15,000 miles per year. Well I do at least 25,000 miles per year. So almost double.
Am I really spending about $14,000 per year? Can someone explain this?

I can leave my job soon and collect a pension. I am just wondering if it is worth staying on the job longer to increase my pension, or is my commute eating up the difference?

Thanks

It is probably somewhat lower than that, but not by a whole lot. Insurance costs don’t increase that much with the added mileage, and only part of the depreciation is mileage-based ( the rest is age-based).

Realistically, your total cost of ownership is probably $11k -$12k per year, and the annual marginal cost of your commute is somewhere in the range of $6k-$8k. You probably have to earn an extra $8k- $10k of pre-tax income to break even with the commute. If you are getting a lot of take-out food or spending on dry cleaning, the total cost of working could be a bit higher. As a rough estimate you need to make at least an extra $10k of pre-tax income just to break even.

[Electrician4you]

Originally Posted by homestead123

So, my current commute is 100 miles round trip an hour each way . I have been making this commute for almost 17 years. My current vehicle gets on average 33 MPG. Its a fairly easy commute highway mostly to the city off hours, so traffic isnt bad.

I just looked at a wear and tear calculator. Geeze! Are those accurate? It says I am spending about $7600/year for a small SUV at 15,000 miles per year. Well I do at least 25,000 miles per year. So almost double.
Am I really spending about $14,000 per year? Can someone explain this?

I can leave my job soon and collect a pension. I am just wondering if it is worth staying on the job longer to increase my pension, or is my commute eating up the difference?

Thanks

How old is the car? Payments? Maintenance?

I had a 120 mile commute (round trip)
My basic costs were a minimum $100 a week. That was strictly fuel and parking fees.
Oil changes every two months.
Trans drain and fill every 6 months
Tires every 18/20 months
Brakes once every 2 years
Spread out I was spending about 160 a week to get to work. Most of my costs were fuel and parking as i diy my own vehicle work it’s basically parts only costs.
This doesn’t include breakdowns.

I joined a vanpool and my costs are fixed $200 a month. My drive distance is 20 miles round trip. My oil changes dropped to twice a year. I really can wait for once a year but that’s ok.


If you’re adding depreciation your costs are gonna be through the roof. You can’t really count it as a expense.

[OutdoorLover]

For 2019, the IRS allows accounting for deductible vehicle mileage at $0.58/mile, which is even a higher estimate. We tend to look at the costs that we actually pay immediately, which would be gas cost... but a fuller accounting would be:
- fuel (gasoline) expenses
- maintenance & repair costs (summed over considerable time and then averaged per mile)
- vehicle depreciation (loss in resale value when miles are added to vehicle)


I also *feel like* driving is cheap - because the immediate, out of pocket expense is low, but I take these estimates seriously and think they are real. Of course, the above assumes your vehicle is "average", whatever that means. You can do a lot better on these costs if you're driving a Toyota Camry that you bought 3 years old for $18K and gets 36mpg and rarely goes in the shop, than if you're driving a Dodge Ram pickup that you bought new for $40K, gets 18mpg and visits the shop twice as often.

[turf3]

Well, let's do some arithmetic

100 miles/day x 250 work days/year = 25,000 miles/year. Let's make it 30,000 to account for some other driving. With reasonable maintenance and intelligent selection of a vehicle you ought to be able to get 180,000 miles, so 6 years. If the car cost you $25,000 that's basically $4000/year in depreciation.

33 miles per gallon at $3.30 per gallon would be $0.10/gallon fuel or $3000/year fuel cost. Add in the cost of periodic maintenance (tires, brake pads, and so on) and I'd guess another $1000/yr. So my rough guess would be that your car could be assessed at costing you on the order of $8000 per year, depending primarily on how long you keep it and what gas prices are like in your area.

Adjust these numbers based on your own experience and you will be able to estimate your cost per year.

[pvande55]

I suppose most drivers ignore everything but gas. But there are repairs, increased insurance, tires, etc. if you borrow money every time you change cars, there is also interest. But the story has another twist. If, for example, your pension goes up by $10 per month $120 per year, that's $2400 over 20 years. Likely that's well over your monthly driving cost, so you may want to keep working!

[turkeydance]

taxes and fees: straw breaks camel's back.