Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Transportation: Fuel Costs


http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adler_Diplomat

1941 Adler Diplomat - Gasifier

Driving a car is expensive. What if you didn't own a car? (This question is of course directed at you who in fact do own one.) If you didn't own a car you would have to live relatively close to your work. Alternatives might be walking, biking, public transportation, van pools, or finding a job that involves teleworking.

If you are in fact one of those who does own a car and can not do the above suggestions you can do other things to make driving your car less expensive. Fuel costs are a major factor in my daily commute; I drive 66 miles round trip for work. I know other people who go as far as 88 miles daily for work.

Tuesday, December 17, 2013

Free Ride Project Progress Report - End of Year 2013



This is the first progress report of the "Free Ride Project".  When we begun this experiment we had the following cars:
  • Car A: Ramsey Rover - 2000 Ford Windstar Mini-Van with around 208,000 miles
  • Car B: Green Machine - 1998 Jeep Cherokee with 230,000 miles
  • Savings assigned to car: $4000
The following changes happened:
  • Phase I car purchased: The Sportscar - 1994 Honda Accord with  168,570 miles (but with a new engine with only 10,000 miles) - Purchased for $3400
  • The Ramsey Rover was deemed beyond economic repair - Sold for $700
  • Insurance was changed to have better coverage and $100 less per month
  •  $1400 was put into the car to improve the ride
The following results are:
  • Cost of the car was $4142 (Initial Cost + Repairs/Upgrades - Sale of RamseyRover)
  • Gas savings for first seven months $840 ($120 a month by using Accord and not Windstar)
  • Gas savings for first seven months $700 ($100 a month by carpooling 2x a week with wife)
  • Savings on insurance rate for first seven months $700 ($100 a month difference)
In seven months the complete savings by the changes is $2240 which means the car actually cost me $1902 out of pocket to buy. At this rate the car will be "paid" for from the initial investment within six months.

The mileage on the Sportscar went from 168,570 miles (10,000 mile engine) to 178,660 miles (20,420 miles on the engine) The Green Machine now has 241,000 miles on it.

So let me know with a comment of what you think.





Thursday, August 29, 2013

How Much Is a Human Being Worth?


 $2,909,130

Upon seeing the web site HumanForSale.com I was able to value myself at $2,909,130. I felt like a cheap discount at a 1 dollar store. How can they just value me at such a low price? According to the web site the highest male was just over 4 million dollars while the average male was worth $2,106,266.  I guess I'm a little above average but, not quite top commodity material.

I live in the United States where the average income is $40,000 per year. If the average person works 30 years they would have generated $1,200,000 just being average. If they invest in themselves they can increase income. If they invest some more wealth will be generated.

10% of $40,000 is $4000 per year. If I take that $4000 and invest it for 10% return on investment compounded annually I would realize $793,571. Then the average American person's worth is then $1,993,571 after 30 years. (Calculating this way a human being is not worth much.) Maybe there is a different way to value human beings, maybe there are some factors missing in this way of calculating.


 Betty Grable

Zig Ziglar had stated on one of his recorded lectures the value of Betty Grable's legs were worth $1,000,000 (they were insured for $1,000,000 by Lloyds of London around 1940). That got me wondering if there were other celebrities with body parts valued.

Troy Polamalu

Troy Polamalu of the Pittsburgh Steelers football team has his hair insured for $1,000,000 by Lloyds of London  (The same company who insured Betty Grable's legs) Hedi Klum had her legs insured for $2.2 Million. I wonder what the difference is from Betty Grable's legs? I think Betty's are worth more than Hedi's after you account for the value of 1940 dollars in today's dollars. (1940-->$1 Million = 2012-->$16.5 Million in real price)

It was kind of a tongue-in-cheek joking around with the celebrities insurance policies, but still you have to think these people are insuring what can be lost if these parts of their bodies are lost. Betty Grable was making about $300,000 a film when she was insured. So basically she was insuring herself for three films and some poster sales.

Really Betty was selling herself short, I'm pretty sure she wouldn't trade her legs for 1 million dollars. They are worth more to Betty than 20th Century-Fox who insured her legs. While the studio was only looking at the revenue side of what they would lose if Betty lost her legs, I'm sure Betty herself would be looking at the quality of life and her loss of mobility.

This makes the point you are worth more to yourself then others think you are worth. It also points to the idea people are worth more then meets the eye. What a human being is worth is directly related to the impact they had on others. Even Betty Grable's legs was worth a lot to many G.I.s in WWII, some who may have kept their moral up enough to make it home alive. Betty's legs motivated some moviegoers to buy tickets to see her movies which provided jobs for many people in the movie industry. How many movie industry people supported their families because of those ticket sales?

It is like the proverb "For Want of a Nail" but, in a more positive way Betty Grable was able to impact many people by having kept nice legs. Something like nice legs is relatively small but, think of the impact.

For want of a nail the shoe was lost, for want of a shoe the horse was lost; and for want of a horse the rider was lost; being overtaken and slain by the enemy,
all for want of care about a horse-shoe nail. 
-Benjamin Franklin
(The Way to Wealth 1758)

You don't just have to be some movie star or celebrity to make an impact you just have to add value to someone's life other then your own. Your value depends on the value you are to other people. Think what a parent is to a child.

Priceless is what a human being is worth because you can always add value to someone else's life.        






Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Free Ride Project - The Application Plan

Free Ride Applied is the outline of "The Plan" to apply the Dave Ramsey "Drive Free for Life" video / concept. The difference is I'm going to actually apply the concept to real life. Of course the example in the video will be changed to my liking as outlined below:

Dave Ramsey Example w/ Assumptions:
  • New car cost: $26,000
  • Car Payment: $475 per month
  • Loan Term: 6 years @ 9.6%
My Start w/ Starter Cars:
  • Car A: Ramsey Rover - 2000 Ford Windstar Mini-Van with around 208,000 miles
  • Car B: Green Machine - 1998 Jeep Cherokee with 230,000 miles
  • Savings assigned to car: $4000
The basic breakdown I'm going to follow is:
  1. Save, Sell & Upgrade Stage
  2. Keep & Invest Stage
  3. Ride, Upgrade and Invest Stage
  4. Invest, and Rest Stage

Save, Sell & Upgrade
  1. Save at least $1500 for phase 1 car (this is the initial car to get you from point A to B)
  2. Buy at least a $1500 - $4000 value car (do due diligence on purchase) This is the phase 1 car. Of course the more I can put down the faster I can get to my goal of having a paid for nice car
  3. Save for 10 months a "car payment" we would normally be putting towards a car bought with borrowed money. Dave Ramsey's video says $475 per month, we decided on at least $200 per month (knowing it will take loner to get to our goal)
  4. Sell phase 1 car and add the 10 month savings to purchase phase 2 car. This would be the upgraded car better than phase1 but, not at our goal yet.
  5. Repeat steps 3-4 until a car is purchased which is at the level we feel good driving at. (most likely at the $10,000 level.) This is the phase X car.
Keep & Invest
  1. Keep the Phase X car
  2. Ride it for the remainder of what would have been the 6 year term had we bought a car at the beginning of the project with debt, instead of buying a phase 1 car.
  3. Invest in a DRIP Index Mutual Fund
Ride, Upgrade & Invest
  1. Sell the Phase X car (hopefully to someone else as a phase 1 or 2 car for them)
  2. Get the cash from the Phase X car and some of the gains from the DRIP Index Mutual Fund and purchase a major upgrade car (My MUC car) The MUC car will be the one I would want to drive and not worry about the gas mileage so much, it has to still be reliable, it will be comfortable. I haven't found my MUC yet but, I look forward to researching it and having the cash to buy it outright.
  3. Continue to invest in the DRIP Index Mutual Fund while I ride the MUC for an extended period (10 years)
Invest and Rest
  1. Take some of the DRIP Index Mutual Fund and buy other style investments like real estate or a business.
  2. Take some of the earnings and send to a charity that makes a difference; one that I most likely already support by this point.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e1/LateModelCelebratesHeatWin.jpg