Our new Kia Rio - Saving on Gas

Yesterday I shared with you that with you that Jordan and I took the plunge to purchase a 2013 Kia Rio EX manual transmission sedan.

In pearl black with a grey interior an 16" alloy wheels - it looks super sporty!

But looks...well that's just a side benefit.  The big reason we are making this change is fuel economy.  When we moved outside of the city and decided that we would commute into work every day, we didn't realize how taxing that would be on the gas budget.

Here is a graph that shows our average gas expenditure over the last three and a half years.

2010 was back when we lived and commuted in the city - into 2013 we carpool but drive upwards of 100KMs a day plus more on weekends and holidays.

Perhaps an even more interesting graph is the ebb and flow of gas expenditure over the course of a year.  Check out this one:

Clearly we drive a lot - and a lot more in the summer then in other months...of course what's not factored in here is the cost of gas and that does fluctuate a lot too.

I took the number of KMs we drove in July and our gas consumption to come up with our average fuel economy for the escape (10.42 L/100Km).  I used the advertised city fuel economy to come up with this chart which projected a savings of $109/month based on a fuel price of $1.20/liter.

Next week, I'll share with you the updated budget which will encompass the savings in gas, plus the new car payment and increased insurance costs.

a Second Vehicle

sooo, Jordan and I bought a 2013 Kia Rio EX standard transmission sedan.

We've been looking at second vehicles for a while now, and while I was happy to wait a bit longer - Jordan was ready to buy now.  The plan is to park the Escape except for big shopping runs (ie costco and camping trips and use the Kia for all of our commuting.  We drive up to 100KMs getting to and from work.  So buying now made sense for a few reasons:

• Start saving on gas now
• Protect the last 5,000 KM of warranty on the Escape before it expires 
• Convenience
• We can afford it

We actually specked out and test drove the following vehicles before narrowing it down to the Kia Rio and the Chevrolet Spark.  While in the price range, we tossed these ones out early on:

• Fiat 500C
• Only had two doors, and no headroom w/ the sunroof option, cheap finishings
• Hyundai Accent
• Felt cheap, glove box hit my knees, not as comfortable
• Ford Fiesta
• Cupholder in door was annoying, no arm rests, lot pricing not consistent with online pricing

...and these once we're just too pricey (I wanted the car to be under $20K)

• Toyota Yaris
• Mazda 2
• Honda Fit
• Dodge Dart
• Nissan Versa

The prices of the two vehicles were so close and the comfort and drive ability so well matched that a few small things sealed the deal.

It was a very close tie, but in the end the Kia won because of a few things: 

• Kia is one of the few sub-compacts that has a proper duel armrest for both front seat passengers instead of a single arm rest for the driver only.
• Kia had an 'oh shit handle' for the front seat
• Leather wrapped steering wheel
• 5 year, 100,000KM bumper to bumper warranty (the others were 60K)
• General fit and finish

One of the biggest reasons we bought the vehicle now (instead of when I get pregnant which was the original plan) was to start saving on gas now, so naturally one of the biggest decision making factors was fuel economy.

Kia wasn't the bst - but came in at a very respectable 6.9L/100KM in the city and 5.3L/100K on the highway.  For my American readers that's a range of 34 to 44 MPG and for my European readers that a range of 41 to 53 MPG.

Jordan and I tracked our fuel consumption for the last few months and are confident that we will save at least $100/month if not more on our gas bill.

Wowza!  So this post is already longer then I had planned on - tomorrow I'll share a few more details about the fuel savings and how that's going to impact the rest of the budget.

Cell Phone Usage

Cell phones...can't live without them....can't live without them.

Jordan and I currently have different cell phone contracts by different providers - I'm with Bell and he's with Telus.  We have been waiting years for our contracts to end around the same time so that we could choose one, and have a joint share plan.  In theory, this should reduce our monthly expenditure on cell phones and perhaps even give us enough features (long distance) that we can finally get ride of our house phone.

To start this process, we have first summarized our usage in the table below.  

Can you guess which chart is from me, and which from Jordan? 

Jordan's on the bottom! 
*note that the last line item was current usage up to September 3, I didn't want to wait a few more days so it might go up a titch more for the current months usage. 

He texts wayyyyyy more than I do and I use a tonne  more data then he does.

Over all, a couple of things are clear.  Here's what we need on a share plan:

• 2G of data
• At least 500 minutes of local outgoing but preferably up to 700
• Up to 100 minutes of long distance 
• Up to 25 picture/video messages 
• Unlimited text messaging nationally (incoming/outgoing)
• Unlimited incoming calls

Jordan also would like both call display and voice mail - I hate voicemail and would be happy with just call display.  What do you think, are we missing anything?

September 1, 2013: Networth Update

Below is our networth update as of September 1, 2013.

We've dipped a bit - and that is because we had one final bill to pay for the backyard last month and the payments we've made to the LOC haven't quite off set it yet.

I'm looking forward to making a lot of headway on the LOC debt over the next few months as things settle down from Summer.

Love this new Album by Only1Noah!

I already bought this on iTunes, but just wanted to share - it's a pretty great album from a Youtube turned professional artist!

CPP & EI - I hit my max!

Woohoo!  I finally hit my CPP and EI contribution maximums.

Now that I've hit my max, my take home pay will increase by $180.56/pay.  For the remainder of the year that's $1,444.48.  I knew this was coming a while ago, and so this extra cash is already allocated toward paying off our backyard project - but it still feels so good when it happens.

For those folks that follow my blog that live outside of Canada, I've put a little blurb below to explain what these two programs are.  

Canada Pension Plan (CPP) 
The Government of Canada established the CPP program in 1966. It is an earnings related social insurance program that provides basic benefits when a contributor to the plan retires or becomes disabled. When contributors die, the Plan provides benefits to their survivors. The benefit is meant to supplement an individuals personal savings, investments and retirement portfolio. The employer is required to contribute the same amount of CPP that is deducted from an employees pay to a maximum amount every year. A CPP retirement pension is a monthly benefit paid to people who have contributed to the Canada Pension Plan. The pension is designed to replace about 25% of a person's earnings from employment. Every employer is required to deduct CPP contributions from an employee's pay if that employee meets certain requirements (age, is in pensionable employment, is not currently receiving CPP benefit through retirement) to the annual maximum, which can change from year to year.

Employment Insurance (EI)
Employment Insurance provides temporary financial assistance for unemployed Canadians while they look for work or upgrade their skills.Typically, you will not be approved to receive an EI benefit if you quit or are fired your job with cause. If you are laid off, this benefit is available for you to apply for. Canadians who are sick, pregnant or caring for a newborn or adopted child, as well as those who must care for a family member who is seriously ill with a significant risk of death, may also be assisted by Employment Insurance. Every employer is required to deduct EI premiums from their employees insurable earnings on every dollar up to the yearly maximum. All employers must also contribute 1.4 times the EI premium withheld for each employee.

Networth Update

Here it is!  Our August 1, 2013 Networth Update!

I'm so proud of this, Jordan and I have come such a long way.

You would have seen a few days ago that our homes value has increased such that our mortgage owing is quite a bit less then what it's worth on the market.

We also continue to contribute regularly to our RRSPs, Pension and Shares.