If you are like me, you loathe spending money on gas. Especially the time when, for no good reason, it goes up five or ten cents over night. Many of my clients seeking personal finance help are searching for tips on saving money in certain areas. For now, I’ll focus on how to manage money in relation to your fuel economy. Keep in mind, It is vitally important that you have a good quality budget in place so that you have a pre-determined spending goal on gas. You could search Google for various budget tools, or go to our resource link for a detailed 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 accelerate quickly (imaging it’s not a town car, but I pretend it’s a Ferrari) versus taking it easy. Studies have shown that fast acceleration, speeding and abrupt braking can lower fuel economy by 33{5db71d874b98728b0b45e030f0931b53aac79686736ebc746cee235fd3432df9} on the freeway and 5{5db71d874b98728b0b45e030f0931b53aac79686736ebc746cee235fd3432df9} city driving. So, take a lesson from my grandma if you want to learn how to manage money better, drive safe and slower. Fewer accidents, save on fuel.
Use Cruise Control – On top of cruise’s ability to allow you to relax your legs on lengthy trips, it also helps you avoid speeding which uses more gas. Also, it limits how often you drop your speed which causes you to speed up more often to get back up to speed. Not only will cruise save you gas, but as you’re using it as a method of how to manage money, you’ll prevent those expensive speeding tickets.
Buy fuel efficient vehicles – There are many benefits with this one. Smaller, more fuel efficient cars are also less expensive off the lot. When I show my clients how to manage money and be more frugal, their pick of a car usually plays a big role. They save cash on the purchase and smaller vehicles are a lot better on gas. When I purchased a 2008 Honda Civic, it qualified for Canada’s eco-auto rebate program. I received $1000 back from the government.
So I know how much you’d love to appear wealthy and successful and have people everywhere staring at your big SUV, but it’s bad for the environment and for your wallet. In most of the how to manage money lessons I have with my clients who are thinking of buying a new vehicle, I tell them to choose cars that are better on gas. 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. Search online or check out our budget spreadsheet to figure out which car you can afford and what vehicle will save you more cash.