41–50 of 79 posts
I'm a huge fan of Sam's blog posts and he is President of YCombinator for a reason, but I'm struggling to understand what Sam think that his personal data point (as a wealthy owner of a Tesla Roadster no less) says about the viability of Uber replacing a family vehicle for normal people. Does he not realize that plenty of people love to drive?
I actually have some personal numbers after owning a second hand 2000 Mustang for 1 year from 112k to 121k miles exactly since yesterday. I got the car for 6000. Uber 9000 miles x $2 = 18000 Personal Car: 7000 Maintenance 2500 - new bumper (old one taken off while street parked) 1000 - replaced foggy headlamps 400. purely cosmetic reasons - side window smashed 800. never park in oakland =( - oil changes etc? (200 at…
That's kind of an aside; I just like old cars and working on them when I don't have to work on them.
Anyhow, the real part I was going to say is that I moved to Atlanta with my wife. She has to drive all over creation because she teaches ballet. We have a new hyundai accent which runs great, but my number one priority was to be close to work so I wouldn't need a car. I live about 1.5 miles from work. I walk to work a lot of days (not so much in the summer). This city sucks for having no car, but if you really plan around, you can. The biggest thing was being willing to live closer to work.
Obviously it's not that easy for people in tons of circumstances that aren't mine, but I wanted to throw my anecdote into the mix fwiw.
I used to commute exclusively by bike in oklahoma. I rode about five or six miles to work and five or six miles back. Had to structure where I looked to live around that as well.
Again, not saying this is viable for everyone, but if you approach it as a lifestyle, it can make a bit more tractable, depending on your context (I have no kids, which makes it a lot easier to)
I didn't do it for the outright savings so much as I hate commuting. I can't stand staring at the road, and eventually I run out of podcasts.
UberX will eventually charge prices more like $0.60 per minute plus $0.20 per mile.
A rough estimate based on the distribution of miles driven is that 30% of Americans should give up their cars under these numbers. Of course, many won't because owning a car isn't purely a financial decision and humans change slowly.
Discussions and imagination move much faster than reality but the world will catch up.
Technical note: The price per hour should be (time-related depreciation)/miles + hourly wage divided by the utilization rate. Mileage should be the sum of fuel costs per mile, maintenance cost per mile, and mileage based depreciation.
Running these numbers for a driver expecting $20 per hour (Average for a Taxi driver is ~$12) with 2/3 utilization and driving a Prius yields a pricing structure of ~$0.60 per minute and ~$0.20 per mile.
I actually have some personal numbers after owning a second hand 2000 Mustang for 1 year from 112k to 121k miles exactly since yesterday. I got the car for 6000. Uber 9000 miles x $2 = 18000 Personal Car: 7000 Maintenance 2500 - new bumper (old one taken off while street parked) 1000 - replaced foggy headlamps 400. purely cosmetic reasons - side window smashed 800. never park in oakland =( - oil changes etc? (200 at…
Hold on, what you're missing is the last part of the essay, the difference in value of time spent driving vs time spent riding an Uber. Say you averaged going 45mph. Then your 9000 miles took 200 hours. And you'd spend $4000 extra to use Uber, so not having to drive would cost $20/hour. Depends how you'd use that time, but for many it would be well worth $20/hour to be able to do other things, like bill hours.
Sam. You own a Tesla Roadster, a car for people who don't have to niggle over money. Most people a) don't live in SF b) have your money c) have access to Uber and d) have a Tesla Roadster. You're essentially talking to yourself and a few choice friends who live in the same bubble as you.
"just did the math. it's now cheaper for me to get rid of my car and uber everywhere (gas, parking, maintianence, insurance, depreciation) ."
And then he posted the calculation on Twitter.
I agree with most of the posters here that the market for Uber totally replacing household vehicles is pretty slim. However I think there could be a larger market for Uber replacing 2nd/3rd vehicles. That said, there are already taxis and car share programs. Uber may be able to take customers from them but I'm not sure that Uber really provides something compelling enough that it would push a large number of people w…
With a taxi, unless you're going from a dense main drag (of either people or taxi-needing people, ie. bars) you call for a cab and it may or may not come some time between now and 2 hours from now, depending on if the cab that's supposed to pick you up got flagged down for a better fare.
And then, in most places, the cabbie will tell you he can't take anything but cash. After some grumbling they might let you pay with a credit card, or they might make you take them to a cash machine.
With Uber you say you want a car and it tells you where the car that's coming is and how long it'll take to get to you. And then when you get there you pay by clicking a button.
> This calculation is why I think Uber is still undervalued. The people who say Uber is only worth $4 billion or whatever don't think enough about people like me who will go from spending ~$500 a year on taxis and car service to ~$12,000 now that the experience and cost have reached a tipping point. This is a lazy analysis. Are there folks who will trade car ownership or public transportation for Uber and services li…
"Are there folks who will trade car ownership or public transportation for Uber and services like it? Absolutely. But what is the size of that market? Literally everyone. Everyone needs to move around their city. The size of the market is the size of the total city scale transportation market which includes car ownership, taxis, public transportation, good walking shoes, pedi cabs......etc. How much of that market ha…
To be fair, the Tesla Roadster is a pretty odd example. I'm not sure $5,000/year depreciation with $3,500/year for maintenance seems reasonable for almost anything. Am I wrong in thinking that most cars depreciating at that rate will have very low or 0 maintenance costs not covered under warranty? For example, a 2014 Honda Civic with 1 mile on it (example) is ~$17k, while a 2013 with 6k miles is ~$15k (KBB values). T…
"Pretty odd" is generous of you. Nonsense is what it is. It's like saying that drinking craft beer for all your hydration needs is cheaper than drinking water, but citing one of these[1] as your baseline for comparison. [1] http://www.therichest.com/expensive-lifestyle/entertainment/...