If you were around back when The Civic Rolls Past 100,000, you’ll know that I’m pretty in tune with my car’s role in personal finances.  Shortly before I wrote that post back in June, I opened an ING account specifically to start putting some money away for a future ride.  On the 100,000 mile day I had all of $34.04 in my future car fund.  Today that total stands at a whopping $104.77.  Nothing significant by any means, but anything on this side of the equation rather than still owing on my car is a good place to be.  My goal is to be able to pay for my next vehicle in cash from this fund, so I’ve still got a ways to go if said vehicle isn’t going to be coming a scrap-yard special.  I feel pretty confident though that a well-taken care of Honda with 105k on the odometer has a long life still ahead.

 

I clocked over 105,000 about 140 days after hitting 100k.  This works out to about 35.7 miles/day.  I did a fair amount of driving in the summer; my work commute alone was about 30 miles round trip.  Now that I’m at school and my car sits in the parking lot for days at a time, I’m not putting on nearly as many miles.  I feel like running some numbers though, so I’ll just use that 35.7 figure as an estimate for my calculations:

 

Driving 35.7 miles per day:

-On November 1st, 2009, I would have 118,030 miles.

-November 1st 2010- 131,106.

-Skip a few to Nov. 1st, 2015- 196,213

I would hit 200,000 sometime during January or February of 2016.

 

It’s fun to run calculations like these, no matter how wrong they will probably turn out to be.  It seems like I’m putting a decent number of miles on the Civic, but 2016 seems like a long ways away to just be getting to 200,000.  It’d be cool to still be driving her then, 10 years after buying it as a high school senior.  That’d definitely give me some time to build up the ING fund, barring any unforeseen incidents (knocks on wood).  Gas will probably be something like $8 a gallon by then, so I’ll be ready to trade up to a hydrogen car or something.

 

Thanks for reading my way-overboard analysis of a pretty routine happening.  :D

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