If you live in the US and drive 15,000 miles (24,000 km) annually in your midsize sedan, then the AAA (the auto club) says you will, on average, spend $9,150 per year on auxiliary costs like gas, tires, depreciation and insurance.
That equates to $760 being extracted from your wallet every month, and it’s made worse the more wasteful your vehicle is – if you drive an SUV, you’re looking at $11,600 per year or $967 every month.
The information comes as part of the AAA’s annual report, published by the Wall Street Journal, and it goes even further with the additional costs, also factoring in (seemingly unimportant) trips to the car wash, parking tickets, garage costs and others (that add up). These can slap another $300 over the total every year, not including the possibility of much costlier speeding tickets.
Naturally, all of this can be debated as perhaps being a bit too general, only giving a broad idea of how things are, but it may be an eye opener to some. It even comes with sensible advice on how to cull these budget deflating trends.
By Andrei Nedelea
Photo Credits: WSJ / The AAA
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