I don't know whether to laugh or cry....

   We got out of our car lease today, after having wasted over two grand for the "luxery" of driving a car. I gotta tell y'all, I think the money would have been better spent on an old rustbucket that ran okay. Or, better yet, bus passes.

    Getting rid of the car will save us around $450 a month, including insurance and gas. Of course, we'll have to rely on friends for rides to the grocery, and we'll have to take the bus to get around town, but that's okay. We did without a car for eight years out of the ten we've been married, so I guess I'm used to it by now.

    The bad part? Picking up our DD after choir will be harder, and will waste a lot of time (our bus service is sllooowww). Taking a sniffly, feverish toddler to the clinic after hours will mean paying for a cab, and God forbid we have to go out of town. I have no idea how we'll get on when we move this summer; we were planning on moving everything in the van, and now we'll have to pay for a truck. Yeik.

    Still, it's $450 a month to go into savings. So I guess that's good...?

-Marika

Hats off to you! Not everyone can go without a car, but if you can do it, more power to you. I think we get spoiled with the convenience and don't think we can do without, but that's all it is for most of us - convenient, not necessary.

And $450 a month is nothing to sneeze at. Are you going to put it toward buying a car in the future, or do you have other plans for it?  

Good for you.  Saving $5400 annually versus a car?   hmmm...even the cost of bus passes and cabs won't even come close to that dollar amount!

I WISH we had public transit out here in farm country--can't wait to move into town and be able to walk or bike everywhere!

If you fairly compensate friends/family for transportation and coordinate your ride with their schedule it will be a good little income flow for them.

You can take groceries on the bus too.

Can somebody from choir provide transportation for fair compensation?

A cab ride can be pricey but that shouldn't have to happen constantly.

Do you have a bus line available that travels state to state?  Bus travel, by far, is the cheapest way to go.

Let us know how it's going. 

   We're saving money to start our own business (ironically enough, I need roughtly five grand to get started, lol). We might get another car in about a year, but only if we decide we really need it.

   Going out of state on a bus for us would mean riding a Greyhound or carpooling with friends now. I loved riding "the big grey dog" when I was a teenager, but I don't think I want to try itwith a toddler, lol. I'm not that brave yet, lol!

   Oh, well. I'm off to go drown my sorrows in coffee. Must...have...caffiene...

Marika

What sort of business are you planning for?

 maybe you should keep a few of those dollars saved in a jar (or even just a 'mental' jar) for times when you do need a cab - even if you have a 20-dollar cab ride every week, that's still a lot less than $450!!  You need to be kind to yourself when the kids - or yourself - are sick.

Keep a bag with a some 'travel only' toys for the little one and a book or something for yourself (I like magazines for public transport - short, easy-to-read stuff) - to make waiting less frustrating. We used to talk about the signs, I'd read out any text we could see (it became a game - I'd have to read everything, even the spray-painted markings on the road!)  and discuss the colours of the cars going by.

THough you sound like a seasoned public transport user. I hope your system is better than ours! 

Brandy:

What sort of business are you planning for?

 

Oh, y'all will cry when you hear this...I did, lol...

I've done the eBay thing before, and ran a flea market booth, but lost the business when we were wiped out financially a few years ago by medical bills. I'm planning on going back into that, but opening my own brick and mortar instead of doing the flea market thing this time-one of our friends has a building he's willing to let us use to run a shop in for free for the first year, so why not?

I've always been hesitant to open a brick and mortar because I'd never found a supplier that didn't try to jerk people over. Until, that is, now. And this is the part we all cry over, because it tells us what the real mark-up is for stuff we buy every day, lol...

Jeans-name brand, neatly packed and sealed in plastic, for $1.73 a pair. Shoes-again, name brand, in boxes, "nice" shoes, for $1-2 a pair. How about a nice, 300 pc load of closeout furniture for $4600? That's stuff like loveseats, sofas, dinettes, etc-not cheap-o stuff.

Yep. Disgusting, huh? They sell food, too. I won't even discuss those prices, because it just makes me sick.

So, anyway, we plan on getting a decent mix of items from these guys, and selling the stuff as cheaply as we can. It's what we did before, and it worked great, lol-it also kept me from feeling like a scumbag for over-charging people. (I used to get wedding gowns for $25-30 each, and sold them on eBay for $40-50; I made a profit, and the customers got a good deal, so everybody was happy, lol).

-Marika

The eye opener for me was working in a nationally known christian bookstore a few years back. I did the shipping/receiving and special ordering. I could not believe the mark up on items the people so willingly purchased. It's like that everywhere. That is the thing that keeps me in check when I decide I want something. All I can think about is whether or not I want to line someone else's pockets.

Good for you in being able to give up your car. I wish I could, but living in the country and not having someone else to take me places is the thing that holds me back.

Good luck! My neice is in the business and I know she can make a living doing the very thing you are saving to do.

Well, I live in Utah and the busses are clean but very slow.  I grew up in south america and the bus system runs every ten minutes or so and it takes you pretty much everywhere.  Yes, they are dirty and overcrowded and they drive like maniacs.  So, my point is, a car is a necessity in the US especially if you have small children you have to take to the doctor.  Back home the doctor came to the house so if you are really sick you don't need a car.