Dear @financial_laura,
Where I live, gas prices are cheaper on some days of the week. Does it make sense to try to buy when prices are a few cents lower?
Depending on where you live in Canada, gas can represent a large portion of your monthly spending. The 2016 Census indicates that average commuting time to work in the major cities is creeping up towards 30 minutes (Canadian average 26.2 minutes) with Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal already surpassing this figure – and that’s just one way!
While every city is unique, I know in Ottawa, the price of gas tends to fluctuate about 10 cents over the span of a week with the lowest prices occurring on Thursday nights. Maybe I’m alone here, but I’ve been guilty of playing ‘gas chicken’ and enjoying the rush of driving with the gas light on that one extra day to score the cheapest gas of the week. Or maybe you’re more practical and just shop for gas at Costco where you can save an average of 5 to 10 cents per litre (excluding the membership cost and the idling cost while waiting to fill up!).
But the big question remains – is it worth it??
Assumptions
To start, let’s assume an annual distance travelled of 20,000km which represents a vehicle that is used to commute around 30 minutes to work. Next, while every car is different, for simplicity let’s assess the average fuel consumption of three types of popular vehicles sizes:
– Pick-up trucks at 13.17L/100km (examples used: F150, Silverado, Ram1500);
– SUVs at 9.41L/100km (examples used: Forester, CRV, Santa Fe and Rav4);
– Cars at 7.53L/100km (examples used: Corolla, Civic, Golf and Elantra).
The Results
Now I don’t know about you, but I found these results to be underwhelming. All my efforts to monitor prices, and time my fill-ups to save $150/year just doesn’t seem to be a fair return, even if I managed to get the full 10 cents savings! Time to get a new hobby.
But, if you drive a larger vehicle, or drive over 40,000kms a year, now you’re starting to see impactful budget savings from actively seeking lower gas prices. If you’re someone in that boat…er, truck…you may want to pay closer attention to price fluctuations by checking gasbuddy.com or using their app. Also, make sure you have a credit card where the benefits of buying gas offer premium returns, like the Scotia Momentum Visa Infinite which offers 4% back on gas purchases.
Have you done the math on just how much money you spend commuting?
This article was first published on my blog at journeyfinancial.ca