Question about getting 3rd car to help with gas costs

[herdtoDisney]

I think the key to saving money with a second or third car, is to have all the cars paid for. It works for me in my situation, because all of our old cars are paid for. Plus, my dh is handy and fixes stuff all the time. If I was making payments on a vehicle, I don't think I'd come out ahead like I do now. I save more per month in gas$ than I spend to keep my van in the driveway-being older, the insurance is cheap and so are property taxes (which we pay on cars here). If it was new and being paid on, this would not be the case.

 

[mikehn]

There are a number of calculators on the web that perform this calculation for you. You just plug in the variables, such as the cost of the car, the price of gas, etc and it spits out a bunch of information so that you can determine whether it makes sense to get a third car. In most cases, it does not. You can do a google search for the calculators.

 

[lucyem]

I think the key to saving money with a second or third car, is to have all the cars paid for. It works for me in my situation, because all of our old cars are paid for. Plus, my dh is handy and fixes stuff all the time. If I was making payments on a vehicle, I don't think I'd come out ahead like I do now. I save more per month in gas$ than I spend to keep my van in the driveway-being older, the insurance is cheap and so are property taxes (which we pay on cars here). If it was new and being paid on, this would not be the case.

I agree with the above. We have 3 vehicles and it works out. But we also own our vehicles outright and DH does basic maintenance on them all.

We have discussed moving to 2 vehicles but in our case we will see the bills increase. We would have payments on a new vehicle and my suv, being larger to make up for not having the truck, would have higher insurance and gas costs.

 

[ceecee]

At that, you could just get rid of the car and buy another $1500 Civic every two years and skip out on all the maintenance and get way ahead if you are averaging 14 mpg now in a gas guzzler. Even driving the car 3/4 of the year and replacing the econojunker every year before state inspections and maintenance would put you ahead.

I would trade in the van on something more gas friendly....there's no way you can do that? I am so glad to not be pumping $4 gallon gas into my minivan, I don't miss it at all. The only issue is I can only haul 5 kids...no exactly a bad thing (I have 1 DD).