Uber says it can replace car ownership. My used Toyota Yaris proved its point.

No 1 had ever been this excited astir a utilized Toyota Yaris.

That was my thought arsenic my woman and I picked up the keys to the car we recovered connected Facebook Marketplace 1 greeting successful August 2025. For the first clip successful 7 years of surviving successful the Washington, DC area, we were car owners.

It was besides a rebuke of sorts for 1 of the companies I constitute astir about often. For years, Uber executives person said that the company's gig-worker drivers — and, increasingly, the self-driving cars connected its app — compete pinch car ownership.

Uber President Andrew MacDonald told a podcast past period that the rising costs of a caller car makes owning 1 a worse woody than respective years ago. And CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said past twelvemonth that the emergence of robotaxis will trim car ownership complete the adjacent 2 decades, making driving a car yourself look "something for illustration horseback riding."

So, did I make a horrible correction spending conscionable complete $6,000 connected a utilized sub-compact car that's efficaciously the adjacent draught horse?

Last month, 1 twelvemonth aft buying my Yaris, I decided to adhd up each my expenses and comparison them pinch the erstwhile year, erstwhile I was car-free and relied connected Uber, Lyft, and nationalist transportation.

Your milage my vary. Your ain calculation will dangle connected wherever you live, the costs of your car, really accelerated it depreciates, and the existent value of state (or charging, if you thrust an EV).

My results showed that Uber mightiness person a point.

The costs of a Toyota Yaris adhd up

My woman and I decided we wanted a car past summertime erstwhile we realized that parking astatine our flat analyzable was free.

Owning a car ne'er made consciousness to america successful Washington. DC is 1 of astir a twelve US cities pinch a accelerated transit system, and a parking spot tin costs up to $300 a month. Plus, hold times for rides connected Uber and Lyft are seldom much than a fewer minutes.

Parking is conscionable 1 of the costs of owning a car these days. The mean sticker value of a caller car is supra $50,000, according to Kelly Blue Book, a Cox Automotive marque that tracks car prices. Used cars, while much affordable, person go much expensive, too. There's besides maintenance, insurance, and, for galore of us, the elevated value of gas.

When my woman and I recovered our utilized Toyota Yaris L — that's "L" meaning the lowest-trim exemplary — we thought that we were being arsenic thrifty arsenic possible. We could bargain the car without a loan. And my investigation suggested that, moreover erstwhile it needed repairs, they wouldn't beryllium that costly connected a small, elemental vehicle. If immoderate car had a chance of rivaling the costs of Uber, this was it.

But it didn't.

After buying the car for $6,000, 1 twelvemonth of car ownership costs america different $5,000.

That's much than 3 times arsenic overmuch arsenic the $1,600 we spent connected ride-hailing trips and rental cars successful the twelvemonth earlier we bought the car.

Some of the expenses were optional, for illustration $250 to person my transmission fluid drained and replaced arsenic a preventative attraction measure. But astir of those costs were the basics: Oil changes, gas, registration fees, insurance, and tolls.

I besides didn't discontinue utilizing Uber aliases Lyft. I took rides to plentifulness of play barroom hangs pinch friends, either because parking was a hassle aliases because I wanted to drink.

Suddenly, free parking started to suffer its shine. Our small sub-compact was much costly than I had expected.

Maybe, though, there's much to it.

'Ready to beryllium driven astatine a moment's notice'

I'm simply the latest personification to comparison whether owning a car makes consciousness successful the era of ride-hailing apps. Even Sam Altman made the comparison successful a blog post backmost successful 2014.

His conclusion: Using Uber was cheaper than driving his Tesla Roadster — astatine least, backmost erstwhile the millennial life subsidy made fares connected the app cheaper than they are today.

Doing a strict costs comparison isn't really astir of america deliberation astir car ownership, though, according to David Keith, subordinate professor of strategy astatine the Melbourne Business School successful Australia.

Keith is 1 of the authors of a 2021 study that asked drivers from awesome US cities really overmuch they would request to beryllium paid annually to springiness up their car.

The nonstop number — $11,197 connected mean — wasn't arsenic absorbing arsenic why group said that they weighted owning a car. More than half of that amount, Keith and colleagues found, was "non-use value," which includes having the action to return a car whenever you want, and a perceived position boost from owning a car.

In different words, drivers are okay if their car sits unused astir of the time. "I tin locomotion outside, and there's this container of metallic sitting location connected the street, fresh to beryllium driven astatine a moment's notice," he said.

I knew precisely what he meant.

For weeks aft buying my car, I had to alteration really I thought astir transportation. Questions for illustration "How overmuch are Uber rides?" and "Is my destination accessible by Metro?" were replaced by a azygous statement: "Just thrust location now, stupid!"

There were besides places I would ne'er person visited without a car: For example, Fredericksburg, Virginia, for a time of antiquing, aliases agrarian Maryland to hunt the tract of a Civil War campy pinch my metallic detector. Being capable to hop successful a car whenever you want feels great. Those are trips that would person been difficult aliases intolerable pinch Uber, and they're the main logic that my woman and I scheme to support our car, other costs and all.

Recreating that state pinch modes of proscription that you don't ain is an important facet of reducing car ownership successful the US, Keith told me.

Some places person tried it. A institution called MaaS Global — that's "Mobility arsenic a service" — operated an app called Whim, which offered taxi rides, motorcycle shares, and nationalist transit arsenic a bundle for a monthly subscription. Whim operated successful respective European cities, including Helsinki and Vienna, earlier MaaS Global filed for bankruptcy successful 2024 and ceased operations.

Meanwhile, successful the US, car ownership has stayed dependable complete the past mates of decades, moreover arsenic alternatives from Uber and Lyft to section bike-sharing programs grow.

"All of these things are fantastic, but nary of them person really led to location being less cars successful cities," Keith said.

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