Jason Bleazard wrote:
> I went through a similar calculation a few years ago, and I re-visit it
> from time to time whenever the price of gas jumps.
>
> How much (ballpark) are you currently spending on gas monthly for the
> Dakota? Any idea how much it would cost to insure an additional vehicle?
> How about the extra maintenance?
Well, on a leased vehicle, the only maintenance is the consumables (oil,
etc.) - everything else should be warranty. I'm changing oil on a
per-mile basis, not per-vehicle - if I put 3K on a car in a month, and
400 on the Dak, I'm just changing the oil in the car instead of the Dak.
Extra insurance, it depends. On a leased vehicle, I'm sure I'd pay
plenty because I have to cover everything. On the '94 Acclaim I'm
getting from my parents, I just need liability - it's not worth putting
collision on a $1000 car.
Even if the Acclaim only gets 24 MPG on the highway, it's 33% better
than the Dak, and I'm not having to replace those big tires at $130 each
due to mileage in 3 months. The truck is 15 months old and I'm at 21K -
my 3/36 warranty will be gone by January at this rate.
I'm doing 100 miles a day.
> In my case, I'd save about enough on gas with a small car that it would
> pay for its own insurance, and I'd be pretty much back where I started.
> This is even with the expensive over-taxed Canadian gas. Of course, it's
> also with the expensive over-greedy Ontario insurance, so it balances out.
> I currently commute 33 miles round trip per day. The first time I looked
> at this, I was driving more than twice that distance, and the same result
> was true (gas was cheaper at the time, but only by about 30%).
> Unless you're willing to flat-out replace the Dak, I'd suggest to be
> really careful about considering all the expenses that go along with an
> additional vehicle. The fuel mileage numbers are tempting, I know. I've
> even tried to use that argument to justify adding a motorcycle to our
> "fleet", but it never works :-).
Yeah, I've run the numbers a few times. This time I think I have a
winning combo though. I'm getting this Acclaim for the price of
registration, and it just had a bunch of stuff replaced on it (struts
are the big item). My brother is finishing the tune-up on it today - at
94K it was still on the OEM cap, rotor, plugs & wires. That alone will
be good for 2 MPG (I'll send you & Bob Tom a pic of the original rotor
compared to the new one, it's scary). Liability insurance won't cost me
too much, and cutting the daily mileage on the Dak will help balance the
cost of the extra car.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Tue Jun 01 2004 - 10:59:13 EDT