A 250cc/500cc large wheel scooter would do fine on the motorway. Peugeot Geopolis, Aprilia Atlantic, something like that. And you'd get over 50mpg I'd expect too.
Most economical car for £1k (or less)
- Thread starter MikeHiow
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A 250cc/500cc large wheel scooter would do fine on the motorway. Peugeot Geopolis, Aprilia Atlantic, something like that. And you'd get over 50mpg I'd expect too.
What about a 125cc Scooter?
Soldato
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^ I'm not really sure how much mpg you'd get from a touring bike, but I'd like to think you could get more than 40mpg... The biggest engined bike I've ridden was a CR500 but that bike wasn't really made with MPG in mind!
I rode one a few years back and it would get up to 80mph without too much trouble (on a private runway)... I suggested a 125cc as you can ride them on a car license afaik...
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![[TW]Fox](/data/man-of-honor/2009.png){kind=avatar}
Right. I've decided to re-cost this using MikeHiow's work postcode of EC1 and accurate prices from the Hovertravel website in order to work out if he's right in thinking this isn't a financially reckless waste of time.
By purchasing a 100 journey card from Hovertravel, Mike can travel for £4 each way, so £8 return each day. This looks to be the cheapest way unless he spends £775 on the 250 journey card.
It is 78.3 miles each way from the Hover Terminal to London EC1. Google Maps reckons this takes exactly 2 hours - but this wont take into account peak time traffic. It's going to take at least 3 hours.
Mike will also have to pay the Congestion Charge unless he parks outside the congestion charging zone, adding yet more time to his stupid commute of massive fail. It is currently £9.
So, the daily cost of the stupidly ridiculous commute of massive fail is so far:
157 miles @ 40mpg (Yes, 40mpg. You are NOT going to get 50mpg. Especially not from a £1k car and certainly not involving a drive through the MIDDLE OF CENTRAL LONDON. 40mpg is probably optimistic - but we'll use it for now) @ £1.35 a litre for diesel is £24 a day in fuel.
£8 a day Hover-Travel cost.
£9 a day congestion charge.
Parking? You are going to pay an enormous premium for parking in London. Lets be really generous and assume you only pay a tenner.
So, total daily cost of the stupid commute of fail: £51.
This is also assuming you teleport yourself for free to the Hover terminal.
3 days a week. 48 weeks a year assuming 4 weeks off. We'll also pretend the car costs nothing to insure, has free tyres and never breaks down or needs an MOT.
A grand total of..
£7344 a year just in getting to work. But thats not all. This is appraising employment option therefore we need to work out how much of your effective salary will go on this stupid plan.
In order to pay £7344 a year commuting costs, you will need to earn, before tax...
£10,000 a year. Yes, thats right, £10k PA.
Now we know from your constant epic posts of fail and flogging the ST because it cost too much etc etc that you are not exactly bringing home £70k a year doing websites from home so I'll be bold and state thats a SIGNIFICANT portion of your pre tax salary. Infact, probably at least 33%.
So, if you earn £30k and do this stupid plan, its like earning £20k somewhere else. It's probably worse because of all the other costs I've not taken into account.
Sorry to be blunt Mike but the idea is worthless. Get used to the idea its time for a new job. String out the curent employer as long as possible, take redundancy, use the £5k you apparently 'wont even miss' to fund yourself whilst you find a job that better suits your personal life and family circumstances. It doesn't even need to be an IT job for now, does it? You've got a family, a job is a job. Take any job - even working full time in a shop probably wont leave you much worse off than you would be doing this stupid commute, but at least you'd actually have time to spend with your family. Then you can find an IT job closer to home without the time pressures, because at least you are working.
Yes, time to spend with your family. Because your projected timings are WAY off.
It's going to take you 3 hours to drive to London. You need to allow this - even if you can sometimes do it quicker. It's going to take you, realistically, at least half an hour to get from your house to your car in Southsea including hover travel. Then you are going to add 15 minutes parking up and walking to the office.
Thats almost 4 hours each way.
4 hours.
That means to get to your desk for 9am, you need to get up at 4am and get out of the house by 5am. Then you finish at 5pm and you get back home by 9pm. Ready to get to bed by 11 in order to be up by 5am again.
And no, a Bike isnt going to half the time you waste (Dont forget time to get the kit off, kit on etc etc and unless you have a death wish you'll soon realise commuting on a bike isnt a Utopia of doing 70mph all the way to the office, my Dad commuted by Bike for years) neither is it going to change the financials much, perhaps removing the congestion charge I guess.
Great.
Face it Mike, the idea is beyond pathetic and is a complete non starter. You live on the Isle of Wight - you can't hold down a job in London. Either get used to the fact you live on the IOW and find a job on the IOW, or get used to the fact that if you want to work in a sector the Island isn't exactly great for, you move house.
By purchasing a 100 journey card from Hovertravel, Mike can travel for £4 each way, so £8 return each day. This looks to be the cheapest way unless he spends £775 on the 250 journey card.
It is 78.3 miles each way from the Hover Terminal to London EC1. Google Maps reckons this takes exactly 2 hours - but this wont take into account peak time traffic. It's going to take at least 3 hours.
Mike will also have to pay the Congestion Charge unless he parks outside the congestion charging zone, adding yet more time to his stupid commute of massive fail. It is currently £9.
So, the daily cost of the stupidly ridiculous commute of massive fail is so far:
157 miles @ 40mpg (Yes, 40mpg. You are NOT going to get 50mpg. Especially not from a £1k car and certainly not involving a drive through the MIDDLE OF CENTRAL LONDON. 40mpg is probably optimistic - but we'll use it for now) @ £1.35 a litre for diesel is £24 a day in fuel.
£8 a day Hover-Travel cost.
£9 a day congestion charge.
Parking? You are going to pay an enormous premium for parking in London. Lets be really generous and assume you only pay a tenner.
So, total daily cost of the stupid commute of fail: £51.
This is also assuming you teleport yourself for free to the Hover terminal.
3 days a week. 48 weeks a year assuming 4 weeks off. We'll also pretend the car costs nothing to insure, has free tyres and never breaks down or needs an MOT.
A grand total of..
£7344 a year just in getting to work. But thats not all. This is appraising employment option therefore we need to work out how much of your effective salary will go on this stupid plan.
In order to pay £7344 a year commuting costs, you will need to earn, before tax...
£10,000 a year. Yes, thats right, £10k PA.
Now we know from your constant epic posts of fail and flogging the ST because it cost too much etc etc that you are not exactly bringing home £70k a year doing websites from home so I'll be bold and state thats a SIGNIFICANT portion of your pre tax salary. Infact, probably at least 33%.
So, if you earn £30k and do this stupid plan, its like earning £20k somewhere else. It's probably worse because of all the other costs I've not taken into account.
Sorry to be blunt Mike but the idea is worthless. Get used to the idea its time for a new job. String out the curent employer as long as possible, take redundancy, use the £5k you apparently 'wont even miss' to fund yourself whilst you find a job that better suits your personal life and family circumstances. It doesn't even need to be an IT job for now, does it? You've got a family, a job is a job. Take any job - even working full time in a shop probably wont leave you much worse off than you would be doing this stupid commute, but at least you'd actually have time to spend with your family. Then you can find an IT job closer to home without the time pressures, because at least you are working.
Yes, time to spend with your family. Because your projected timings are WAY off.
It's going to take you 3 hours to drive to London. You need to allow this - even if you can sometimes do it quicker. It's going to take you, realistically, at least half an hour to get from your house to your car in Southsea including hover travel. Then you are going to add 15 minutes parking up and walking to the office.
Thats almost 4 hours each way.
4 hours.
That means to get to your desk for 9am, you need to get up at 4am and get out of the house by 5am. Then you finish at 5pm and you get back home by 9pm. Ready to get to bed by 11 in order to be up by 5am again.
And no, a Bike isnt going to half the time you waste (Dont forget time to get the kit off, kit on etc etc and unless you have a death wish you'll soon realise commuting on a bike isnt a Utopia of doing 70mph all the way to the office, my Dad commuted by Bike for years) neither is it going to change the financials much, perhaps removing the congestion charge I guess.
Great.
Face it Mike, the idea is beyond pathetic and is a complete non starter. You live on the Isle of Wight - you can't hold down a job in London. Either get used to the fact you live on the IOW and find a job on the IOW, or get used to the fact that if you want to work in a sector the Island isn't exactly great for, you move house.
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Man of Honour
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Wow, good post Fox.
Mike, it seems really untenable to me
Unless you drive up to london, stay for 3 nights and then drive back. Doing it daily is absolute madness.
Mike, it seems really untenable to me
Unless you drive up to london, stay for 3 nights and then drive back. Doing it daily is absolute madness.Oh forgot to add - don't discount Portsmouth traffic as well. I've had to drive from Southsea to the M275 in rush hour on several occasions and it's always taken at least 30 minutes closer to 40 minutes. Realisically it's going to be an hour of driving before you even get a chance to open the tabs on the A3M.
And I reckon I've vastly under-rated the costs of parking a car all day in EC1 as well, so its probably more.
Why are all his threads like this? Just full of delusion and fantasy and him completely trivialising everything.
Soldato
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get the train?
red jet season ticket for 12 months is £2105
southampton to waterloo for 12 months is £3920
tube is £1104 per year
£7129 per year
would take 25 mins + 10 min walk + 1 hour 15 + tube time each way with a lot less faffing
red jet season ticket for 12 months is £2105
southampton to waterloo for 12 months is £3920
tube is £1104 per year
£7129 per year
would take 25 mins + 10 min walk + 1 hour 15 + tube time each way with a lot less faffing
I parked near Gresham Street last week for 2 hours, it cost me £8, fair enough there are NCP's but they are always never where you want them to be and even then I doubt they would cost less than £15.
infact looking here confirms that
http://en.parkopedia.co.uk/parking/ec1/
infact looking here confirms that
http://en.parkopedia.co.uk/parking/ec1/
So it costs more or less the same - almost £10k before tax of salary going on travel - he then has to get to Cowes, which is what, 30 minutes from Ryde?
So, 30 minutes to Cowes. 10 minutes transfer time onto Red Jet which then leaves. Gets to Southampton 25 minutes later. Southampton Central is at least a 15 minute walk. Then a 10-15 minute wait/station transfer time befoer he's on the train. Then 1 hour 20 on the train into Waterloo. Then 30 minutes on the tube. Then 10 minute walk to office.
So, in total, thats...
3.5 hours.
So it costs about the same, £10k before tax, and takes about the same time, almost 4 hours.
So using the train does nothing to change this commute from its current status is 'beyond retarded'.
![[ui]ICEMAN](/styles/overclockers/avatars/5.png){kind=avatar}
Soldato
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Don't do it. I understand you have to have a job but be realistic here; you're going to do more damage than good with this solution. Some of the advice here has been very accurate and honest, I suggest you look carefully at whats been said and rethink your strategy accordingly.
You don't *have* to work in London, this is just a case of you being too proud to do what's necessary to take care of your family. No-one will think less of you for working locally doing something that's not related to your field or something that pays less money - in fact, that's the mature thing to do and you'd be respected for it. Paying the bills does not involve potentially ruining your family life.
I commute 2 hours each way to medical school because the best medical school is not my local one. The major difference for me is that I can do it without having to worry about a $1k car blowing up on me and because my guaranteed earnings in this field are astronomically higher than my costs. Even I will be getting a place local to the school next year because the travel time takes up too much of the day. It's better for me to be home at the weekends and have *no* work to do than to be traveling back and forth each day, getting home late and still having work to do when I want to spend time with my family.
I promise you this journey will grate on you very quickly and will be a detriment to both your health *and* your marriage as believe me, with even the best of intentions when you get home, you will not be able to fulfill your duties as a husband or father as you may want to; you'll be exhausted and have to think about getting up the next day to repeat it all over again.
Take the redundancy package, sign on if you have to (no-one's going to think less of you, you pay your taxes like the rest of us) and work somewhere else, perhaps even locally part time or in a different industry until such time as the job market favours you again. Your family will thank you for it, far more than what you're suggesting now.
You don't *have* to work in London, this is just a case of you being too proud to do what's necessary to take care of your family. No-one will think less of you for working locally doing something that's not related to your field or something that pays less money - in fact, that's the mature thing to do and you'd be respected for it. Paying the bills does not involve potentially ruining your family life.
I commute 2 hours each way to medical school because the best medical school is not my local one. The major difference for me is that I can do it without having to worry about a $1k car blowing up on me and because my guaranteed earnings in this field are astronomically higher than my costs. Even I will be getting a place local to the school next year because the travel time takes up too much of the day. It's better for me to be home at the weekends and have *no* work to do than to be traveling back and forth each day, getting home late and still having work to do when I want to spend time with my family.
I promise you this journey will grate on you very quickly and will be a detriment to both your health *and* your marriage as believe me, with even the best of intentions when you get home, you will not be able to fulfill your duties as a husband or father as you may want to; you'll be exhausted and have to think about getting up the next day to repeat it all over again.
Take the redundancy package, sign on if you have to (no-one's going to think less of you, you pay your taxes like the rest of us) and work somewhere else, perhaps even locally part time or in a different industry until such time as the job market favours you again. Your family will thank you for it, far more than what you're suggesting now.
Can we all just recommend a £1000 car pls?
I vote Octavia ex-taxi.
to be honest, we're doing the OP better service by talking him out of taking a job that requires an 8 hour round commute than by just quoting random <£1000 cars at him.
Seriously Mike, i've got a family, i've been there. I ended up working in a call centre on 12k a year just to pay the bills. But it was a 15 minute commute and was monday to friday 9 till 5.
You can't put a price on the time you spend with your family. They're only young once and once they've grown up its too late. You've got the rest of your life to work in london and commute silly hours to get the job you want.
I've been there, i had to compromise on what i wanted - i wanted a job in IT but with mouths to feed there was no time to be picky. I don't regret it for a minute either, because they are only young once. You can't get back those years when they're cute and learning to walk and talk etc..
Don't do it
I've seen families who are very well off because their fathers commuted into london everyday. The commute got that long they ended up living in london monday to friday because the hours were that long. Yes they were a finance director in the centre of london earning bucket loads of cash, and have retired by the age of 50. But by the age of 50, the kids have taken their GCSEs, are now on the verge of moving out, and he's missed it all.
Its not worth it.
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Don't underestimate how bad traffic in London can **** your **** up. It took me over 1 hour to drive from Shaftesbury Avenue to Theobald's Road - which is the area I'd assume you'd have to drive through to get to EC1. It's not viable in the long term.
Soldato
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[TW]Fox;18312698 said:
oh I agree! - worked two days in a row at the excel centre in docklands from southampton central and the commute killed me !
Soldato
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I think Fox is being generous and underestimating costs on this one especially to keep a 1k car running. Adding 25-35k per year in mileage as an estimate based on a 3-4 day week in London to a car that may be near end of life anyway is not a good call. The main thing is you can’t afford the down time of maintaining a 1k car for your commute when you need total reliability to make those times.
Mike, I think you are probably underestimating the intensity of a city job (assuming reasonable salary) and assuming you will be able to do a 9-5 effectively in a London working environment. If you try to do a compressed week with this amount of travelling you will be wrecked. You also have to assume you won’t need to be in the office every day and the weeks will go like clockwork.
However, working in London is perfectly doable for you.
My suggestion is you look for a B&B in Basingstoke and stay there Mon, Tues, Wed night so in the office Mon to Thursday and walk to BSK station from the B&B. You could even look at a room to rent as may work out cheaper on a weekly rate even if you don’t stay there all week.
You will have a 1 hour commute to central London on the Train then a few mins on the tube
You can do home to Basingstoke pretty quickly which means up first thing Monday morning, park at the B&B etc, in the office for 10am. Then you can comfortably work decent days and get home 10 ish Thursday night. You can get the early trains into waterloo frmo BSk which is a bonus.
You should be able to get a salary sacrifice scheme for your rail and underground so you will save on tax as it comes out of your gross salary. Should save you ~20% and means you don’t have to pay it all at once.
It shouldn’t work out any more expensive than driving it but it will give you a much better quality of life and more importantly you will be worth having in the job rather than total wrecked zombie at the desk from the commutes.
A railcard with zones 1-6 should be about £4,500 from Basingstoke.
You can negotiate rates on the B&B if a long term resident but assume £60pw (3 nights) so say £3,000.
Total £7,500 + travel to and from Basingstoke to IOW once per week.
With salary sacrifice on the season ticket this comes down further in effective costs.
Ok so you won’t be tucked up in your own bed every night but you will be in a state to enjoy time with your family when you are there.
Mike, I think you are probably underestimating the intensity of a city job (assuming reasonable salary) and assuming you will be able to do a 9-5 effectively in a London working environment. If you try to do a compressed week with this amount of travelling you will be wrecked. You also have to assume you won’t need to be in the office every day and the weeks will go like clockwork.
However, working in London is perfectly doable for you.
My suggestion is you look for a B&B in Basingstoke and stay there Mon, Tues, Wed night so in the office Mon to Thursday and walk to BSK station from the B&B. You could even look at a room to rent as may work out cheaper on a weekly rate even if you don’t stay there all week.
You will have a 1 hour commute to central London on the Train then a few mins on the tube
You can do home to Basingstoke pretty quickly which means up first thing Monday morning, park at the B&B etc, in the office for 10am. Then you can comfortably work decent days and get home 10 ish Thursday night. You can get the early trains into waterloo frmo BSk which is a bonus.
You should be able to get a salary sacrifice scheme for your rail and underground so you will save on tax as it comes out of your gross salary. Should save you ~20% and means you don’t have to pay it all at once.
It shouldn’t work out any more expensive than driving it but it will give you a much better quality of life and more importantly you will be worth having in the job rather than total wrecked zombie at the desk from the commutes.
A railcard with zones 1-6 should be about £4,500 from Basingstoke.
You can negotiate rates on the B&B if a long term resident but assume £60pw (3 nights) so say £3,000.
Total £7,500 + travel to and from Basingstoke to IOW once per week.
With salary sacrifice on the season ticket this comes down further in effective costs.
Ok so you won’t be tucked up in your own bed every night but you will be in a state to enjoy time with your family when you are there.
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If his employer offered such a scheme they would already have told him about it.
As it is, your idea doesnt reduce his costs at all either and involves him living away from his girlfriend and months old baby for 3 days a week. Whilst this might be worth it long term if he was progressing through the forces or something, to do it to sit in an office designing websites is just a complete mixup of priorities.
As it is, your idea doesnt reduce his costs at all either and involves him living away from his girlfriend and months old baby for 3 days a week. Whilst this might be worth it long term if he was progressing through the forces or something, to do it to sit in an office designing websites is just a complete mixup of priorities.
Soldato
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[TW]Fox;18313162 said:
Most City employers can offer it and if not there are ways to get them to join a scheme.
I didn't say it would reduce his costs but it will improve his quality of life. It is likely to reduce costs though and certainly be more reliable for him.
If he does this as a driving commute then he won't have any decent quality of life during the days he is doing it and for the days he is home be realistically totally nackered.