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Have you calculated your commute?

May 8th, 2018 at 06:33 pm

Have you ever calculated the cost of commuting? I say that because now we have a direct cost. My DH commutes on average 30 minutes one way instead of 1 hour plus. And an hour is generous because usually coming home before it was 75-90 minutes. But assuming he saves now 1 hour an day total in commute he's saving 5* 48 weeks = 240 hours a year. What is an hour worth?

That's the question. If it's worth $25/hr then it's $6000/year of $500/month he's saving. So we could "shave" off $500/month on our mortgage payment moving closer. If we calculated the hour is worth $50/hr then it's $12,000/year and $1k/month. That makes moving closer a lot more beneficial.

Personally I think moving closer worth $50/hour. Assume we go out to eat more, pay more in gas, pay more in child care, etc I think we can easily save $12k/year moving closer. But some people live next door to their parents so they commute far. If i had that sort of deal I'd do it too.

Have you ever calculated what your commute cost you? Was it worth it to move farther? Why?

Posted in Cars | 5 Comments »

5 Responses to “Have you calculated your commute?”

  1. debtfreeme Says:
    May 8th, 2018 at 09:14 pm 1525810485
    1525810485

    I moved about 6 months after I'd begun working at this office 10 years ago. My commute (10 miles) took me 30 minutes on a good day. Now it is less than 7 minutes (used to be 4 but they added a traffic light and a stop sign to my route) and about 1.5 miles. Sometimes I ride my bike to work - but that is a little dangerous.

    All the time I saved was incredible when I started. I actually can go home for lunch if I chose to but usually I bring my lunch.

  2. ceejay74 Says:
    May 8th, 2018 at 10:35 pm 1525815312
    1525815312

    I guess if I were to do it, I'd figure out my hourly? So say he makes $200K per year, and with commute that takes 11 hours per day. His hourly pay would be $70 per hour.

    If his work day plus commute becomes 9 hours per day, and he's still making the same salary, then his pay is now $85 per hour. Pretty good "raise"! Big Grin

  3. PatientSaver Says:
    May 9th, 2018 at 02:17 pm 1525871853
    1525871853

    Commute time has always been a top priority for me, but in terms of time, not money.

  4. rob62521 Says:
    May 9th, 2018 at 04:43 pm 1525880626
    1525880626

    Personally, I think a shorter commute would be a good financial move. It means less stress on the commuter and more personal time. Our small city, it never was a huge concern, but I know one of the reasons I liked the last school I where I worked was it was a 2 minute commute. Since I worked in Chicago for a year and did a one hour commute one way, 2 minutes seemed like a luxury after all these years.

  5. LivingAlmostLarge Says:
    May 17th, 2018 at 07:38 pm 1526582285
    1526582285

    short commutes really are a luxury. He makes substantially more so the hourly is quite a bit more. It's easily worth the savings of our mortgage over our rent. Even with the large differential.

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