I am new to this thought process but I dont see that much of an upside to not having a car unless you live in a big city. Living in Michigan it would be very difficult to do things without a car. How do you go camping, fishing, adventure?
We are a two car - two adult household. My car sits in the garage 99% of the time until I need it to go someplace further than 10-15 or carry lots of stuff etc. Mainly, I end up using it to go to the airport or on longer weekend trips. I think that car sharing could (and should) definitely become more commonplace in the future. So much more efficient to pay for your occasional use vs. constantly paying and/or tying up a chunk of cash in something that just sits and depreciates most of the time. I would consider downsizing if car sharing became available in my immediate area.
I looked at what it would costs to rent a car, via enterprise, and took the costs of our second car and divided it. Even discounting gas, we would need to rent a car 33 days to equal owning the car. Since we used the car less than 33 days/year, we sold our second car. Maybe do that math?
Yup, I threw together a basic spreadsheet to figure it out and I'm thinking that even for weekly use, your breaking even with purchasing a 10 year old vehicle if you factor in Taxes, Registration, Maintenance, Insurance, Depreciation and Opportunity costs. The biggest drawback is that it's a pain in the a$$ to go rent a car every time you need one. The closest rental is a 5 mile bike ride from the house and usually I need the car because I'm carrying enough stuff to warrant it. The other issue is that while I'm only
physically driving the car about once a week for less than an hour at a time, I need it available for more than that i.e. multi-day camping trips, trailhead or airport parking lot.
These problems are logistically solvable with technology. That's why I'm so intrigued by the possible proliferation of car sharing services not just in major cities but suburbs as well. I love the idea of being able to walk out my front door, walk maybe a few blocks to an available car swipe my phone and head on out. Then if I'm going to the airport, I park it somewhere for free and it becomes available for the next guy who just landed and needs a car. Every car could be linked up with GPS and software could track all the vehicle locations, anticipate demand and incentive pricing to make sure that cars end up where they need to be. In the future, cars could become automated but we have the current technology to make this work right now.
Benefits include freeing up tons of parking since there are so many fewer cars just sitting around doing nothing.
Use your garage space for a workshop or workout area.
Sharing of resources is more environmentally friendly. Free up capital for more productive uses.
Faster fleet turnover due to increased utilization rates. This would lead to much faster adoption of new technology.
No need to buy a car for the worst case scenario i.e. transporting 7 passengers in the snow while towing a trailer once a year (again more efficient).
No need to perform vehicle maintenance or car washing etc
Greater flexibility to combine with biking when necessary
This type of approach would combine the best worlds of biking and public transportation with the freedom and flexibility of personal vehicle ownership.
Thoughts?