Do you think its better to have a car or not if you arent well off?

[itsagooddaytosavehives]

We do ok, but we live hand to mouth, private rent. we occasionally have meals out but not often. All have enough clothes etc but nothing designer or fancy. we have a lot of debt which is being paid via debt management plan. We have zero savings, as in, there is about £10 in my husbands account and £80 in mine. we both get paid weekly though so that means we arent ever without food etc

I was just thinking, is it wise for us to have a car? we have kids so there are times we need to leave our village, but there are busses going to two towns.

the car costs roughly £65 a month insurance, £24 a month tax £30 a month petrol (we don't use it that much) and that isn't including mots, repairs tc

obviously I know we need to be able to get somewhere in an emergency, but if we put just the insurance and take money in a pot each month that could act as an emergency taxi fund?

I know its not ideal but our car is on its last legs and I know its going to need loads doing on its MOT next month

any thoughts>?

It doesn’t sound like you can afford a car. Just use public transport and save up the money that you would have spent on car related costs (tax, petrol) so that you have some money for a treat in the summer.

Do you need a car for work?

I'm a single parent, low earner, private rent and I have never had a car. My work and DS's school are walking distance and the public transport is good where I live. We walk as much as we can, good exercise and it's lovely in summer. I spend less than £40pm on transport.

Even on my low wage I have spare money for treats, holidays and days out as I save loads of money from not having a car. I'm saving to buy a house too.

that's what I think, although I mentioned it to DH but he thought it was ridiculous to not have a car. I mean we can obviously afford one but we would have more money if we didn't. it isnt so much the monthly cost but we really cant afford if things go wrong, were often without a car for a few week till we can afford to sort it out.

but then I think what about things like the kids swimming lessons etc, it would be a really hard thing to manage. there is public transport but its not overly reliable or regular

Surely it depends where you live and what value the car would bring.

If it would make you very isolated then IMO you need it. If it enables work then it's probably a worthwhile cost. Swimming lessons - you need to weigh it up but it sounds like very expensive swimming lessons to me.

Will not having a car limit your options for getting to work/changing jobs? That was the main reason I learned to drive as an adult- I was restricted in what jobs I could go for by the transport links

I could get 2 buses to my mums and my brothers house. a bus to the next village to my best friends house, it limits days out but I have anxiety with driving far away anyway so wouldnt necessarily stop that especially if we saved up for days out on public transport

my husband doesn't drive and gets the bus/taxi to work already. I drive but not to work as I work in the village, but yes obviously it would limit where we wouild be able to go if we were to look for somewhere else

Bus fare is really expensive these days but it sounds like you rarely use the car. Very handy for shopping and emergencies though.

For the car you have, it does seem poor value for money. £30 petrol is probably only going to buy about 200 miles a month, if it's mostly local journeys, or less than 50 miles a week. Almost certainly cheaper to get buses, taxis or can your DH get a bike to get to work?

The insurance and tax are both very expensive, but that's probably because it's an old car, you're quite young, and it's a high insurance group?

For comparison, until a year ago, I had a PCP on a brand new Skoda Citigo for £130 pm. The tax was £20 a year or less than £2 a month, the insurance was £20 a month and it cost me £130 a month (and no deposit payable), so it was about £150 pm plus fuel for a brand new car with only fuel to pay for because it was under warranty and didn't need an MOT for 3 years.

Once you've added the cost of repairs and MOT to the £89 a month you're already paying, your car probably isn't going to be significantly cheaper than mine, even though it's probably quite old and not worth much?

If it's fairly worthless, perhaps scrap/sell it so you don't have to spend on it for the MOT and try to manage without and if you can't look out for a low insurance group low tax car, as small as you can manage with, to reduce the fixed costs as much as possible?

If you're not paying out for your current car, might you be able to save up a few hundred pounds over the next few months to pay for one - or try and get a low rate credit card to spread the cost over the next couple of years cheaply - if it cost £1000 over 2 years, it would cost about a tenner a week to pay back the credit card.

You can get shopping delivered, so once less reason to need a car.

I would personally think it’s best not to get a car. I manage without one and it does complicate things sometimes but I just have to plan in advance if I know i’ll need to get a taxi if buses don’t go where I need them to

Thanks all. I can't get a credit card as I have bad credit, but yes I already get my shopping delivered because it's easier, so most journeys are taking picking up from nursery (but that's only twice a week and there is a bus or it's a 30 minute walk) , going into town, but again there's a bus.

Why don't you try not using the car at all for a month or so and see how you get on?

How reliable and frequent the buses are is a massively important factor here, and that varies a lot between areas.

With that extra info then I'd say yes potentially get rid of the car, just time it right so your insurance don't sting you for early cancellation if you can. The only worry I'd have then is if you did find you can't manage without a car it could be difficult for you to buy back in to having one, if you see what I mean?

Cars cost about £100 a month to run (insurance, MOT, vehicle excise licence etc) (that was an old calculation I did a few years ago so it may have increased by now)

Sounds like it would be a good idea to get rid of the car. Even taking a taxi now and again would be much cheaper for you.

We don't have a car because we use public transport to get to work. We'll travel around town on a bike and have almost all shopping delivered. We hire cars when we need to leave town or travel somewhere remote.

I hadn't thought about hire cars, that's an idea for holidays, will have to look into how expensive that is