Today, as I was driving home from work, my low gas light on my Nissan Rogue came on. My plan was to get gas from one of the gas stations near my house, which is often 5-10 cents cheaper than other locations around the area. There are two gas stations right at the corner of the intersection where I turn to go home. Normally, the gas prices are exactly the same and I choose the station that is more convenient. When I’m on my way home, I choose Hess but when I leave from home, I choose Royal Farms.

But today, Royal Farms gas price was 5 cents cheaper than Hess. I had two options:

A. Get gas at Hess and pay $3.24 per gallon. My normal fillup is around 15 gallons.

B. Get gas at Royal Farms and pay $3.19 per gallon. However, to get there, I have to wait through one set of traffic light and wait another set of lights on my way home. At worst scenario, that would be an additional 90 seconds if I were to get stuck at both red lights.

I decided to save money and get gas at Royal Farms. As I was pumping, I realized that I would only save 75 cents for the entire fillup. Then I proceeded to lose 90 seconds by having to wait at both lights. So on my way home, I opened my calculator app on my iPhone and proceeded to do the math.

75 cents per 90 seconds equates to $30 per hour. $30 per hour equates to $62,400 per year!

If I feel that my time is worth $30 per hour, then my decision to get gas at Royal Farms was good.  If my time is worth more, then it was a bad decision. For me, if Royal Farms was 5 cents cheaper every day, then I would choose to pay for gas there all the time. If the two gas stations were few miles apart, then cheaper gas would become more expensive. But since the two gas stations are equal in price most of the times, I don’t think saving 75 cents for 90 seconds of my time is not worth it. For $1.50, I wouldn’t mind doing it.

What do you think? What’s your price cutoff point?

How often have you driven to the gas station across to the other side of the street just because that gas station charge $2.759 instead of $2.769 at the gas station on your side of the road? I have done it countless of times, until I realized that I was only saving 15 cents for the entire full tank of gas. To save 15 cents, I had to make a U-turn to get to the other side of the road, pump gas, then make another U-turn to return to be on my original destination. It surely was not worth the effort. Even if i save 15 cents every fill up for the entire year, I’ll save a total of mere $8/yr if I filled up once every week. But what if it was 2 cents cheaper at the other gas station, or 5 cents, or even 10 cents cheaper? Will it be worth it then? How many miles are you willing to drive out of your way to get to the gas station that is 5 cents or even 10 cents cheaper?

Don’t Travel Too Far For Cheap Gas

Previously, I wrote about ways saving money and gas at the gas station. But if your gas station is too far away, those savings could be negated, even if the cost of gas may be cheaper. I’ve compiled a chart below where it shows how far you can travel to purchase cheaper gas for it to break even. If you can travel less than what’s indicated in the table below, then you found yourself a bargain. If you have to travel further, it’s best to stay put and stick to the gas station closer to you. Please note that this table assumes that your car receives 20 miles to a gallon, control gas price is $3.00/gallon and your average fill-up volume is 13 gallons.

Basically, if another gas station has cheaper gas, it must be less than 1 mile away and the price must be at most $2.988/gallon. But let me clarify the max distance allowed. When I say “1 mile away”, I mean total roundtrip distance. So in essence, it can only be 0.5 mile away from where the $3.00 gas station is. It will take another 0.5 mile to travel back to your original location. If the gas station across the street is 1 cent cheaper, then it is cost effective to go there. But again, this does not account for the inconvenience it will cost you to get over to the other side of the road. If you know a gas station that offers 5 cents less, it better not be more than 2 miles away (4 miles total) or you’ll end up paying more for cheaper gas.

Use Gas Cards

I always use my Chase Mastercard to pay for all my gas purchases. It used to give me 3% back. On certain months, it gives me 5% back, depending on the offer that is available during that month. Nowadays, there are so many credit cards that is specially tailored for paying for gas. To discover other credit cards besides Chase Mastercard that offers cashback bonuses for gas purchases, you can go to cardoffers.com by clicking here. Review and select the credit that meets your needs and then sign up.

Pump Gas Better

If you’re like a typical American person who drives a car, you’ve probably already wondered if there ever will be relief on gas prices. With the economy the way it is now, we’re all trying to discover ways to minimize our spending costs. Sure we can cut down on our driving habits, but we can cut down only so much, especially when we have to go to work everyday. There are roughly 2.3 cars per household, and with over 110 million households in the United States, that equates to about 250 million cars that are being driven on our roads every day. Now, that’s a lot of cars and a lot of gas!! Image the positive effect it would have on the environment if we all learned to drive our cars in a more efficient way. It turns out that every gallon of gas that’s burned by our cars emits about 20 lbs of CO2 into the atmosphere and eliminates the same amount of breathable oxygen! So, I did a little research and found 4 easy ways to save gas simply by changing the way we pump gas in our cars. Not only do we save money, but also has a positive impact on the environment.

1. Buy gas only in the morning (the coolest hours)

Believe it or not, buying gas early in the morning will save money. Applying basic science, we know for fact that the gas is most dense when the temperature is low. When the temperature gets warmer, the gasoline expands. So, if you buy in the afternoon or in the evening, then your gallon is not exactly a gallon. By pumping gas during the coolest hours of the day when the ground temperature is cooler, you will actually get more gas for the money. The difference is very little, but it still helps.

2. Pump gas on low speed

When you are filling up at a gas station, it is recommended to not squeeze the trigger of the nozzle at the fast setting. Most gas stations have three trigger settings: low, middle, and high. Pumping gas on a low speed minimizes the vapors that are created while you are pumping. All the hoses at the gas stations have a vapor return so if you pump at the fast speed, then some other liquid that goes to your tank becomes vapor. What this means is that the gas vapor that have already been metered will be sucked up and back into the gas station’s underground storage tank. In the end, you are paying money for something that you do not get, thus you are getting less gas for your money.

3. Do not pump when the inventory is low at a gas station

I hate it when I’m at a gas station and the pump is so slow! Time seems to go by much slower when you’re standing there waiting and waiting for it to finish pumping. I just end up being on my iPhone trying to keep entertained. Other times, I take this time to clean the car and throw away any trash that accumulated since my past fill-up. I always wonder to myself that having a recycle bin at the pumps would be a good idea since so many people are throwing away trash while pumping gas. Anyway, I digress. This gives me another reason not to pump when the inventory is low. Do not fill up your gas tank if there is a gasoline truck pumping into the underground storage tank when you stop to buy gas. When the gas station storage tank gets filled by the truck, the gasoline is being stirred up and agitated. So, if you get gas from this gas station storage tank, the gas that is being pump into your vehicle will contain some of the dirt that normally settles on the bottom.

4. Fill up when your gas tank is half full or half empty

Another important tip is to fill up your tank when your gas tank is half full or half empty, whatever you prefer to call it. Most people don’t realize that the more gas you have in your gas tank the less air it occupies the empty space. If there are more air in your gas tank, then it gives more opportunities for the gas to evaporate. When you can minimize the air inside the gas tank, you are also minimizing the gas evaporation. Therefore, you are saving gas when your gas tank is constantly filled.

These tips will not save you enough money to become a millionaire overnight, nor will it save the entire environment all at once. But these are little steps that we can take to help save the environment, one gallon at a time. If you have some other gas saving tips, please let me know!