Author Topic: How many miles per year?  (Read 11263 times)

wifeytini623

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How many miles per year?
« on: January 01, 2015, 07:53:52 PM »
Hi mustachians!

Fairly straightforward question - how many miles do you drive your car, per year? In the past year (well, 12-15 months) we've put 10k miles on our (paid-for-in-cash) car. How do you guys compare? Is 10k high? Average? Low? Worthy of a facepunch?

(This isn't a good representation of how much we usually drive, btw. My son has some intensive medical needs and his orthopedic surgeon is 90 minutes (one way) from our house...over the summer and through the fall he had weekly appointments...yeowch. But other than that we don't use the car much.)

Interested to see how you guys compare!

alsoknownasDean

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #1 on: January 01, 2015, 07:58:56 PM »
I've only recently bought a new car (after a year without one), but in my last car I did 56000km/35000miles in four years.

That's 8750 miles a year, not commuting to work (train for that), but driving to other parts of the city, my parents' place outside of the city every few weeks (probably a good 40% of that), and a couple of interstate trips.

Towards the end I was averaging a little less, maybe doing about 200km a week on average. Had I not forgotten to take note of my car's odometer on the first of January, I would have been able to challenge myself to do under 10,000km for the year :)

MsPeacock

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #2 on: January 01, 2015, 08:13:17 PM »
Generally right about 8K per year that includes most years a 9 hour drive to see relatives. I didn't do that drive last year, and won't do it this year - so probably will be closer to 7k or less for 2015. I drive to work, but not far 8 miles) . I actually hate road trips, and avoid local shopping that requires me to got more than about 5 miles from my house (basically the distance to the nearest Target and Shoprite). Otherwise if I need something I'd rather order it online and have someone drop it off at my doorstep.

Calvawt

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #3 on: January 01, 2015, 08:17:37 PM »
I have a very short commute, so I've only put about 6k on the car I got in February.  That puts me on pace to be at about 6.5k for the year.

Frankies Girl

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #4 on: January 01, 2015, 08:25:36 PM »
I got a new car at the start of 2013 and am averaging 7,000 miles a year. I drive about 25 miles to work round trip, but we don't use my car on the weekends or for other trips in general, so it will stay pretty low

I've heard somewhere that the average for most drivers is 13,000 miles/year.

PencilThinMust

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #5 on: January 01, 2015, 08:35:09 PM »
21k a year.  uhh!

Knapptyme

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #6 on: January 01, 2015, 08:53:31 PM »
Outside of a 2200 mile round trip to see family twice a year, we average somewhere around 8000 miles in all our motor vehicles combined. This counts, however, our vehicle being used by our nanny as a business vehicle. She logs about 40 miles per week with it. She could do less than that for sure, but the tax write-off is so worth it given the actual cost to us.

So, we might use a motor vehicle for about 7000 miles of personal use not related to road trips to see family. All things included, I hate to say it, but we're close to 12000 miles annually.

DarinC

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #7 on: January 01, 2015, 09:18:14 PM »
My wife and I are probably at ~20k miles/year each.

bacchi

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #8 on: January 01, 2015, 10:24:09 PM »
66000 miles over 12 years so 5500 miles/year  (8851 km/yr).

MoneyCat

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #9 on: January 02, 2015, 07:42:28 PM »
I also average about 10,000 miles per year in my car.  I have to drive for my commute, because that's pretty much how it has to be for my profession and the state I live in.  Luckily, it's only a 9.5 mile commute each way by highway.  The costs are less than the typical car, though, because I drive a hybrid, so there is less wear and less maintenance.


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Calvin

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #10 on: January 03, 2015, 06:29:00 AM »
I drove 6500 miles last year. That included a 2,500 mile cross country road trip when I moved. So, probably less than 5,000 in an average year. I'm only 3mi from work now. This year my goal is to get into biking to work, so hopefully I can lower that still. I've never really enjoyed driving though.

chasesfish

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #11 on: January 03, 2015, 07:36:56 AM »
25,000 total, of that half is personal or commuting, the other half is reimbursed through work.  Of that personal/commuting, a portion of those miles were vacation or visiting family

thedayisbrave

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #12 on: January 03, 2015, 07:41:00 AM »
Right around 10K/yr on mine though that'll likely go up significantly as I'm now a real estate agent (but those costs can also be deducted). 

Sid Hoffman

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #13 on: January 03, 2015, 09:25:21 AM »
I purchased a new (used) car on April 1, 2014 with 140,150 miles on it.  On January 1st it stood at 143,355 so that's 3205 in 9 months, or about an annual average of 4300 miles assuming I do similar mileage going forward as I've had in the past nine months.  I have a job where I work from home, so the majority of my mileage is to spend time with family that lives outside of cycling distance, or shuttling my son around for various things.  I try to use my bicycle whenever possible for things like grocery shopping for anything I can fit in my bike trailer.

Bob W

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #14 on: January 03, 2015, 09:38:23 AM »
12k,  spouse= 7k

minimalist

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #15 on: January 03, 2015, 09:53:55 AM »
About 2.5k a year for me.

Sid Hoffman

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #16 on: January 03, 2015, 10:16:56 AM »
I've heard somewhere that the average for most drivers is 13,000 miles/year.

Yeah, the government actually keeps stats on it:

http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/onh00/bar8.htm

Unfortunately for things like money and mileage, the average isn't really what matters, the median is, and they don't report the median mileage.  The median should be lower than the average because, well, because that's how statistics work.  Somebody who drives 7000 miles a year only brings down the average by 6000 miles but another person who drives 25,000 miles a year raises the average by 12,000 miles.

The median is likely close to 12,000 and if you look at it, that's the mileage that most leases and warranties are designed around.  People are generally OK with a 12k/year lease or warranty because that really should cover more than half the population.

2Birds1Stone

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #17 on: January 03, 2015, 10:30:52 AM »
I purchased my car 46 months ago with 13,000 miles, it now has 58,000

Thats an average of 980 miles/month or 11,800 miles a year.

This included 2 trips from NY to FL, numerous vacations to PA, Upstate NY, Maryland, DC etc.

kudy

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #18 on: January 03, 2015, 10:40:42 AM »
Average of 2013 & 2014 is 8,282 miles per year.

I drive to work most of the time, 26 miles round trip. I try not to drive outside of this commute, but my car is often used for weekend trips, visiting nearby family, etc... I try very hard to ride only my bike on the weekend, and when the weather cooperates, to work once per week. If I didn't make that effort, it would probably be ~2,000 miles higher.
« Last Edit: January 03, 2015, 01:04:24 PM by kudy »

BlueMR2

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #19 on: January 03, 2015, 12:20:27 PM »
I did around 7,200 miles spread across 2 cars and a motorcycle.  My wife did 2x that with just one car.

MUCH reduced from previous years.  Work moved closer to my home and cut my mileage in half.  I'd been doing around 15,000 a year previously.  Not too many years before that when I used to go visit friends all the time (none of which live in the same city as me) I was doing 25,000 a year.

r3dt4rget

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Re: How many miles per year?
« Reply #20 on: January 03, 2015, 12:35:33 PM »
33k miles a year for the last few years on my 1998 Civic. I bought it in 2010 with 125k miles, now has 240k. You can now conclude that 10k miles a year is not high mileage lol