Gas Saving Tips – Personal Finance Basics
If you are a normal person, you loathe filling up at the pump. Especially when, for no good reason, it jumps up 5-10 cents in one day. Many of my clients seeking personal finance help are searching for tips on saving money in various areas. I’m going to focus on how to manage money as it relates your fuel economy. As a side note, I think it’s important for you to have a good quality budget in place so that you have a pre-determined spending goal on gas. You can look in google for various budget tools, or check our resource link to find a comprehensive budget spreadsheet. Here are three very useful tips.
Drive Sensibly – My grandma’s Lincoln Town Car has a mileage gage. It’s amazing the change on the gage when I am accelerating quickly (pretending it isn’t a town car, but rather a Ferrari) versus taking it easy. Studies have shown that hard accelerating, higher speeds and abrupt braking can lower fuel economy by as much as one third on the highway and 5% around town. So, take a lesson from my grandma if you want to begin to manage money better, drive sensibly and slow. Less accidents, save on fuel.
Use Cruise Control – Not only does the cruise control let you to rest your legs on long trips, it can prevent speeding which sucks back the gas. Also, it prevents you from dropping your speed causing you to have to accelerate more often to get back up to speed. Not only will cruise save you gas, but because you’re using it as a method of how to manage money, you will avoid those expensive speeding tickets.
Buy fuel efficient cars – There are many benefits here. The initial cost of smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles are lower. When I show my clients how to manage money and be more frugal, their vehicle choices often plays a huge role. They save money when they buy and lighter cars are much better on gas. When I purchased a 2008 Honda Civic, it qualified for Canada’s eco-auto rebate program. I got $1000 back from the government.
So I know how much you’d love to feel important and successful and have people everywhere staring at your massive Sport Utility Vehicle, but it’s terrible because of the higher emissions and for your wallet. In many how to manage money lessons I have with my clients who are looking at a new car, I tell them to choose fuel efficient vehicles. They will not only have more money to save for their future after they buy the car, but they’ll also save lots of cash on their gas. Look on the Internet or check out our budget spreadsheet to figure out what car you can afford and what vehicle will save you more money.