I really want to get my own wheels.
Can I afford a car on minimum wage?
The basic minimum wage is $7.25 per hour.
If you work full time every week for a full year, you’ll earn almost $19,000 a year.
That’s enough to buy a car, after taxes.
Transportation averages 14% of your paycheck for poor people, because you still have to
pay for rent, food and other stuff too.
For one person working full time, that averages to $239 a month.
So I could get a $230 a month car payment.
No, because that $239 dollars has to cover car insurance and gas.
Now you’re down to a $180 car payment, $40 gas, $20 for cheap auto insurance.
It’s hard to lease a car on that budget.
Do what the millionaires in the millionaire next door book do and buy a used car.
Let someone else pay the depreciation.
A brand new Kia Rio is about 12K, with a monthly payment around $230 a month.
Scrimping and saving up a larger down payment for a car lowers the monthly payment.
Then you could afford a lower car payment and money left over to drive it.
Picking a longer loan term lowers the monthly payment.
Then you end up with debt after five years.
They call it negative equity to make it sound better than 10K in the hole on a 10 year old
used car with 100,000 miles on it.
I could ask my parents to cosign for the loan.
Didn’t they already go in the whole to borrow for your college education?
Why not just ask a relative for a hand-me-down car instead?
I’d be driving a hoopty!
That’s embarrassing.
Is it worse than walking to work or riding the bus today?
Try ride-sharing and car-sharing programs while you save up for a car.
Don’t I have another choice?
Sure.
Get a second job, or find a higher paying one.
I’m already stuck in a McJob, despite my college degree.
Your other choice is living at home to dramatically cut your rent.
Then most of the 19K you earn goes to taxes, loan repayments and saving for a car.
Live in my parents’ basement to have my own ride, or live in a tiny apartment while
I save up for a car.
Not much of a choice.
You could do the stupid thing and live in the new car.