Budget Freak

It’s now been two months since I’ve started BudgetFreak. In those two months, I’ve written 45 posts, and have received 70 comments. I’ve gotten about 1,000 unique visitors, 3,000 visits, and about 9,000 page views. I’m not breaking any records, but still much more than I was expecting.

If you’ve missed anything in the past two months, here’s what I’ve done to help myself out financially:

• Saved $75 using coupons
• Saved $300 canceling my gym membership
• Opened up an interest earning checking account at ING
• Lowered my credit card interest rates and increased my credit limits
• Started earning interest borrowing $16,800 from credit card companies for FREE, taking advantage of 0% balance transfers
• Checked my free credit report
• Opened a ROTH IRA and maxed out my 2006 contribution
• Opened a Washington Mutual Savings Account earning 5% interest
• Will save $500 a year by driving slower
• Participated in my first Blog Carnival
• Will save about $400 a year by shopping around for car insurance
• Managed to grow my net worth by 33%

I’d say I’m off to a pretty good start. So thank you all for reading and commenting, and here’s to many months to come!

I have heard that by driving slower, say around 55 or 60, that you could save money on gas. PFAdvice says you can save up to 20% by driving slower. I was skeptical, but I’ve been trying over the past couple weeks, and it works.

Before, I used to average at least 75-80 mph on the highway. Even though I drive on the dreaded 405 every morning through the Westside (if you’re not from Southern California, think of the worst traffic zone in your area, then mulitple by 1,000,000,000,000,000 and you’ll get an idea), I wake up at 5am so the road is pretty clear. The past two weeks I’ve been changing my driving habits. I’ve kept my speed as steady as I could, using cruise control when possible, slower acceleration, less braking, and trying to stay behind large trucks whenever possible to cut down on wind resistance. I’d say my average speed for the last two weeks was around 65 mph.

Because I keep extensive gas mileage statistics, I know I’ve been getting around 18.5 mpg for the past 2 years. My best mileage, ever, per gallon for a tank of gas was 20.69. Well this past week, I averaged 22.2 MPG. A new record for me and a 20% increase over my average MPG, and nearly 10% better than my previous best! I couldn’t believe it!

If I’ve been speding $200 a month on gas, which I have been, a 20% savings will save me $40 per month, and $480 for the year. All for driving 10 MPH slower.

Now you’re probably thinking to yourself, ‘well sure your saving a few bucks, but it takes you forever to get to work.’ While it’s true it will take longer to get places, but probably not as much as you think. My commute is about 35 miles door to door. Ignoring traffic congestion, stop lights, and city streets for a minute, if I average 75 MPH, it will take 28 minutes to get to work. If I average 65 MPH, it will take me 32 minutes. A difference of only 4 minutes. Not that big of a deal.

Besides the gas savings, there are plenty of other benefits. For one, it’s a lot safer driving slower, and I never have to worry about speeding tickets. I’ve also noticed I’m much less stressed while driving. Before I’d get upset if there was a slow driver in front of me or if traffic was moving too slow. Now, I almost hope traffic is moving slower (55 PM would be ideal).

So there you have it. Slow down, and save $500 a year. Try it out for yourself.

Eek!! I went to get gas this morning, and the price had shot up to $2.99 a gallon! Just last week I filled up for around $2.80. That’s about 20 cents in a week! Looking back at my gas milage statistics, the price hasn’t been this high since last August or so. What gives???

Here’s the most discouraging news of the week, from CNN/Money.

The Los Angeles metro area was again the nation’s least affordable market. Only 2 percent of the homes sold during the quarter there were affordable to those families bringing home the median earnings for the area, $56,200. The median sale price was $525,000.

Coming in a close second, was Orange County, just south of LA. These would be the only two markets I could possibly live in with my job. I’ve been wanting to own a home for a long time, but this is the main reason I’ve been unable to. I guess I’ll have to wait for the market to crash (which may not be too far fetched), or wait for the next big earthquake to scare everybody away.

Link: Most Affordable Housing Markets

Since I bought my truck (a 2005 Nissan Frontier) in April of 2005, I’ve been keeping a log of every time I’ve filled up with gas. There were times I forgot the receipt or the machine ran out of receipt paper, but overall, I’ve managed to record about 90% of my fill-ups. I love looking at statistics, so below some fun gas facts from 2006.

• I recorded 41 trips to the gas station, pumping 742.3 gallons of gas, costing me $2,133.98, and covering 13,777.1 miles
• My average cost per gallon in 2006 was $2.87, and my average cost per mile was $0.155
• The cheapest gallon of gas was the first fill up in 2006, of January 6th, costing me $2.27
• The most expensive gallon was on May 18th, costing me $3.40 (OUCH!)
• I averaged 18.55 miles per gallon in 2006, with a maximum of 20.69 mpg and a minimum of 14.64 mpg
• I averaged 336.02 miles per fill up, with a maximum of 407.6 miles
• The most I paid to fill up in 2006 was $67.46, and the least was $39.15
• When I started by new job in September, my commute was about the same distance, 30 miles each way, but the breakdown between highway and city streets went from 50% city/50% highway to 10% city/90% highway. The average cost per mile went from $0.167 from January to August, to now $0.129 from September to December

I graphed out the price of a gallon over the year (note I missed a few readings between August and September, hence the sudden drop during that time), but overall, it’s almost a perfect bell curve, with prices rising in summer, and then cooling off in the winter.

If the last few months of my gas usage is any indication, 2007 should be much less expensive for me. Let’s hope anyway.