# My Cost Analysis (Richmond, VA)



## me2dumb4college (Aug 27, 2015)

Hi all,

First to introduce myself. I'm Justin and my Uber network is in the Richmond VA area. Current pricing structure is 1.05/mile and .18/min. I wanted to get a better understanding of what my actual costs are relative to the payout based on mileage.

Data:
My MPG (Hwy/City Combined): 20mpg

Gas Cost/Per Mile
$2.50/$0.13
$2.75/$0.14
$2.85/$0.14
$2.95/$0.15
$3.05/$0.15

Tires (assuming I get 30-40k miles)
Cost+Labor Est (x4): 500-600
Tire Cost/mile: $.01-.02

Oil Change (assuming 3.5k mile change)
Cost Reg 25-35
Cost Syn 55
Oil Change/mile: .01-.02

Brakes (life and cost vary but still worked out to be under a cent/mile)
Cost Est: $175 for 30k Miles
Brake Cost/mile: .01

Now this is where it gets interesting. I ran cost calculation thinking that I would be depreciating the value a lot by Ubering, so I wanted to know exactly what that cost would be per mile. My figures come directly from NADA, which isn't the best source, but it was readily available.

2005 Nissan Murano Vehicle Depreciation
Miles/Value/Amt Depreciated
N/A
N/A
20000 9037
30000 9037 0
40000 9037 0
50000 8825 212
60000 8325 500
70000 7875 450
80000 7475 400
90000 7125 350
100000 6800 325
110000 6525 275
120000 6275 250
130000 6025 250
140000 5850 175
Miles/Depr./Depr. per Mile
10000 $325 $0.03 100k
10000 $400 $0.04 80k
10000 $500 $0.05 60k

So the equity of the vehicle lost isn't nearly as bad as I was anticipating. But I'm using an older vehicle and this has surely got to be wider on a newer car:

2010 Nissan Murano Vehicle Depreciation
Miles/Value/Amt Depreciated
100 19450
10000 18900 550
20000 17925 975
30000 17025 900
40000 16250 775
50000 15525 725
60000 14900 625
70000 14325 575
80000 13925 400
90000 13350 575
100000 12900 450
110000 12475 425
120000 12075 400
130000 11700 375
140000 11350 350
Miles/Depr./Depr. per Mile
10000 $450 $0.05 100k
10000 $775 $0.08 40k
10000 $975 $0.10 20k

So it's nearly double for a 5 year newer model. I didn't do a new vehicle, but obviously that would be signifcantly more.

Analysis:
Uber takes 20%, so let's start with $.84/mile (1.05*.8). I'm not going to factor in time, yet because you can do that on your own later. But using conservative estimates I'm looking at spending money on $.02/mile (brakes), $.01/mile (oil), $.14/mile (gas), and $.04 (depreciation/equity loss) for a total of $.21/mile.

So for Uber in my area with my vehicle, you really net about $.63/mile + $.18 for time/min. It would be a little less for newer cars, but with better fuel economy it may even out.

I welcome any feedback, thanks for reading.
- Justin


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## Simon (Jan 4, 2015)

me2dumb4college said:


> Hi all,
> 
> First to introduce myself. I'm Justin and my Uber network is in the Richmond VA area. Current pricing structure is 1.05/mile and .18/min. I wanted to get a better understanding of what my actual costs are relative to the payout based on mileage.
> 
> ...


Beautiful! Nice Job! That is exactly what an Uber driver should be doing. Now with the above calcs lets do some more math...

Miles @ $.80 per mile minus 20%.

$.64 per mile paid to the driver. Assumption a driver goes 5 miles to pick up a minimum fare (3 mile trip) and has to (not always) drive back 5 miles.

5+5+3=13 miles driven to collect $4

13×.21=2.73operating cost

4-20% (Uber fee)=$3.20 -$2.73 (op cost)=$.47 profit. Then pay taxes on that. Then pay registration car tax, and insurance.

Cmon $90000 a year!


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## me2dumb4college (Aug 27, 2015)

Hey Simon, I did think about including taxes, but everyone here has such a wide range, I just assumed they could figure it out. Your calculation looks to include uber's fee twice; once in the per mile, and then at the end after fare price.

Another thing I neglected to add was the base fee, so that would offset some of the costs there in your scenario. But I'm with you man, it's def. not as much as advertised. And at least in my area, it's not a constant flow of pings.


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## uberguy_in_ct (Dec 29, 2014)

They also take the 20% from per minute rate


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## me2dumb4college (Aug 27, 2015)

uberguy_in_ct said:


> They also take the 20% from per minute rate


Ah yes, good catch.


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## UberBlackDriverLA (Aug 21, 2014)

Dead miles, SRF and repairs?


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## me2dumb4college (Aug 27, 2015)

UberBlackDriverLA said:


> Dead miles, SRF and repairs?


Well, I think those misc costs are just costs of owning a vehicle. Perhaps interior wear, but again those are so far in between and varied that it's not going to be more than a cent per mile. It may seem expensive at the time though.


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## UberBlackDriverLA (Aug 21, 2014)

Safe Ride Fees are not part of owning a car. 

Dead miles are a reality you cannot avoid. You have to drive to the client without getting paid, but you will be incurring costs. You also drive between trips and your return home. 

You are smart to drive an old car, but you can't have it both ways. You either drive a new car with less repairs but more depreciation or you drive an old one with less depreciation but more repairs. Either way each mile you drive, your repairs increase and are not part of owning car. The more you drive, the more will will spend on repairs, period.

You brought out another good point, loading passengers in a car is much harder on the vehicle than driving yourself around. With the extra weight, mileage decreases, the engine works harder and suspension parts wear faster.

And when you get in an accident, you better have that $1000 deductible saved up. And if it's an injury accident, prepare to hire an attorney.


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## Aw Jeez (Jul 13, 2015)

Don't forget the cost of insurance. Even though Uber covers you while you're working for them, you still have to have your own insurance and that has to be factored into your cost per mile. Do you have a loan on the car? That has to be accounted for too. It all adds up to an amount of money that it costs you to drive EVERY mile, Uber or personal.


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## UberBlackDriverLA (Aug 21, 2014)

Aw Jeez said:


> Don't forget the cost of insurance. Even though Uber covers you while you're working for them, you still have to have your own insurance and that has to be factored into your cost per mile. Do you have a loan on the car? That has to be accounted for too. It all adds up to an amount of money that it costs you to drive EVERY mile, Uber or personal.


Whether you have a loan or if the car is paid for is irrelevant. What matters is how much your asset decreases in value because of Ubering and I think the OP has a good grasp on that.

Insurance is a tough one because it is definitely a fixed expense that you would have whether you uber or not. So it's not really an expense of Ubering. HOWEVER, In most cases, your car is not covered by your insurance or Uber's insurance in the first phase of app on/no client in the car yet. It's a HUGE gap in coverage. Most Uber drivers do not understand this. So any additional cost of getting proper insurance should be included as an expense.


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## Simon (Jan 4, 2015)

UberBlackDriverLA said:


> Whether you have a loan or if the car is paid for is irrelevant. What matters is how much your asset decreases in value because of Ubering and I think the OP has a good grasp on that.
> 
> Insurance is a tough one because it is definitely a fixed expense that you would have whether you uber or not. So it's not really an expense of Ubering. HOWEVER, In most cases, your car is not covered by your insurance or Uber's insurance in the first phase of app on/no client in the car yet. It's a HUGE gap in coverage. Most Uber drivers do not understand this. So any additional cost of getting proper insurance should be included as an expense.


That gap coverage is a *****. I try to stay home while waiting for a ping, but once im out after that first drop off, my fly is open.


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## PHXTE (Jun 23, 2015)

Aw Jeez said:


> Don't forget the cost of insurance. Even though Uber covers you while you're working for them, you still have to have your own insurance and that has to be factored into your cost per mile. Do you have a loan on the car? That has to be accounted for too. It all adds up to an amount of money that it costs you to drive EVERY mile, Uber or personal.


That depends.

If you bought the car specifically to Uber with and you're one of the few that purchased commercial insurance, then sure, include that into your calculation(I venture to assume both of these apply to a vast minority of drivers).

However, if it's your personal car that you'd be making payments on anyway and you're just using your personal insurance like most people do, then it's already a fixed cost, and it shouldn't be included in your cost structure.


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## Aw Jeez (Jul 13, 2015)

Of course it should! It costs you money to drive that car EVERY mile. Even when you're not Ubering, the car is still costing you money per mile. So when you're figuring how much you "make" you have to include all expenses on that vehicle. The cost of personal insurance doesn't go away simply because you want it to. 

If you do it right, you'll discover that your car probably costs $0.25 - $0.35 for EVERY mile you drive, including the miles you put on for Uber. And if you put 50,000 miles per year on your car, you'll have spent a minimum of $12,500 to run it. If only 35,000 of those miles earned revenue from Uber at a net of $0.75/mile, then you only "made" ($26,250 - $12,500) $14,000. Not bad for a part-time job but that sure ain't full-time income.


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## me2dumb4college (Aug 27, 2015)

Hey Aw Jeez, thanks for reading. So most insurance plans are based on a 6 month or year payment. To calculate cost for that on a mile basis, you'd need to estimate how ever many miles you plan to drive, which using your 50k miles per year, that would be a very low cost per mile, my guess is not even a cent, but at most a few cents. Lot of factors including driving record come into play there, but I think you may be over-estimating cost of insurance.

As for net, as you can see in my calculations, I'm already at .63/mile, factoring in insurance, dead miles, and return miles, you could probably make the case that my net is slightly less, like in the upper .50s? 

A few others things, like surges and tips that I cannot include in the calculations.


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## PHXTE (Jun 23, 2015)

Aw Jeez said:


> Of course it should! It costs you money to drive that car EVERY mile. Even when you're not Ubering, the car is still costing you money per mile. So when you're figuring how much you "make" you have to include all expenses on that vehicle. The cost of personal insurance doesn't go away simply because you want it to.


You're simply wrong here, sorry. Your car payment and your insurance premium are what's called a fixed cost, which means you're going to incur it whether you're Ubering or not.
Therefore, it's inproper to be including that as a cost of driving Uber because you would be paying them regardless.

Or to turn that around, take the same amount you're trying to incur as a cost for your car insurance and your car payment. Would you be saving that same amount of money if you werent Ubering?

No, you wouldn't. It's a fixed cost. You're paying it whether you drive 1000 miles or no miles.

Don't get me wrong, I'll take any opportunity to take a shot at Uber, but it's simply ignorant to charge a fixed cost for your personal vehicle to Uber.

(This is assuming you didn't buy your car to Uber with and you're not paying for commercial insurance. I would presume most people here haven't done either)


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## UberBlackDriverLA (Aug 21, 2014)

PHXTE said:


> You're simply wrong here, sorry. Your car payment and your insurance premium are what's called a fixed cost, which means you're going to incur it whether you're Ubering or not.
> Therefore, it's inproper to be including that as a cost of driving Uber because you would be paying them regardless.
> 
> Or to turn that around, take the same amount you're trying to incur as a cost for your car insurance and your car payment. Would you be saving that same amount of money if you werent Ubering?
> ...


Once again, the car payment or having the car paid off doesn't have bearing on your Uber earnings. What matters is the decrease in value of your asset for each mile driven.


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## Aw Jeez (Jul 13, 2015)

I'm not trying to take a shot at Uber. I'm just trying to get Uber drivers to realize the true cost of operating their vehicles. It's not as cheap as they think.

Of course nobody knows how many miles they will drive a car in advance. And yeah, insurance is a "fixed cost" but that doesn't mean it can't be used to figure out cost/mile. We can make certain assumptions. If I drove my personal car 20,000 miles last year, chances are I'll do it again this year. Full coverage insurance on my van is $3,500/year (a son who's on the policy with one at-fault accident jacks the rate up). This means that I'm paying $0.175/mile for insurance if we drive 20,000 miles again this year. If I add another 15,000 miles of driving for Uber for a total mileage of 35,000, my insurance cost is $0.10/mile. My van gets 16 mpg in the city. Gas in Pensacola is currently about $2.25 for a per-mile cost of $0.14. So there's ($0.10 + $0.14) $0.24/mile without even considering expenses like tires, oil changes, unscheduled maintenance, etc. Yes, some of those items are just pennies per mile, but pennies add up.

Cost of operation has nothing to do with earnings/revenue. It merely tells you how much money you have to SPEND to earn money with your car. And that's the point, isn't it? Uber revenue isn't "free money." The cost of operation of the car is measured by more than just, "I earned $300 last week driving for Uber and only spent $50 in gas so I made $250!" Uhh, not really.


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## PHXTE (Jun 23, 2015)

UberBlackDriverLA said:


> Once again, the car payment or having the car paid off doesn't have bearing on your Uber earnings. What matters is the decrease in value of your asset for each mile driven.


That's pretty much what I said, no?​


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## me2dumb4college (Aug 27, 2015)

Aw Jeez said:


> I'm not trying to take a shot at Uber. I'm just trying to get Uber drivers to realize the true cost of operating their vehicles. It's not as cheap as they think.
> 
> Of course nobody knows how many miles they will drive a car in advance. And yeah, insurance is a "fixed cost" but that doesn't mean it can't be used to figure out cost/mile. We can make certain assumptions. If I drove my personal car 20,000 miles last year, chances are I'll do it again this year. Full coverage insurance on my van is $3,500/year (a son who's on the policy with one at-fault accident jacks the rate up). This means that I'm paying $0.175/mile for insurance if we drive 20,000 miles again this year. If I add another 15,000 miles of driving for Uber for a total mileage of 35,000, my insurance cost is $0.10/mile. My van gets 16 mpg in the city. Gas in Pensacola is currently about $2.25 for a per-mile cost of $0.14. So there's ($0.10 + $0.14) $0.24/mile without even considering expenses like tires, oil changes, unscheduled maintenance, etc. Yes, some of those items are just pennies per mile, but pennies add up.
> 
> Cost of operation has nothing to do with earnings/revenue. It merely tells you how much money you have to SPEND to earn money with your car. And that's the point, isn't it? Uber revenue isn't "free money." The cost of operation of the car is measured by more than just, "I earned $300 last week driving for Uber and only spent $50 in gas so I made $250!" Uhh, not really.


Hey Jeez, this was pretty much the intent of this post, to calculate those factors into a loose model that I could use to see what my net take home would be per mile. As you can see in my calculations, the other maintenance costs are so low, it's just a few cents/mile.

One more thing I didn't bring up is Risk - because that's not really measurable here. Most of the time, we are driving during the peak DUI hours, so we are more at risk for accidents. Not saying you couldn't die driving to the grocery store, but it's still something to consider.


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## chi1cabby (May 28, 2014)

me2dumb4college said:


> I'm looking at spending money on $.02/mile (brakes), $.01/mile (oil), $.14/mile (gas), and $.04 (depreciation/equity loss) for a total of $.21/mile.


On average, an Uber Driver will drive 1 Dead Mile for 1 Paid Mile.
So your true cost basis is $0.42/Mile.


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## turbovator (Aug 3, 2015)

me2dumb4college said:


> Hi all,
> 
> First to introduce myself. I'm Justin and my Uber network is in the Richmond VA area. Current pricing structure is 1.05/mile and .18/min. I wanted to get a better understanding of what my actual costs are relative to the payout based on mileage.
> 
> ...


The IRS allows you 57.5 per mile for your total vehicle expenses for the 2014 tax year. The IRS has never been known to be overly generous when it comes to tax deductions. The 57.5 cents is the straight mileage deduction it includes all vehicle expenses. You can't itemize vehicle expenses if you use the straight mileage. It's a one or the other deal. Run your math with this method see how it compares. Be sure to include all miles not just the trip miles,


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## me2dumb4college (Aug 27, 2015)

turbovator said:


> The IRS allows you 57.5 per mile for your total vehicle expenses for the 2014 tax year. The IRS has never been known to be overly generous when it comes to tax deductions. The 57.5 cents is the straight mileage deduction it includes all vehicle expenses. You can't itemize vehicle expenses if you use the straight mileage. It's a one or the other deal. Run your math with this method see how it compares. Be sure to include all miles not just the trip miles,


Turbo, how would you go about calculating this? There's no way that the IRS can know how many miles it took me to get a fare, but at the same time, I have no way to prove it took me whatever miles. Do you just operate under best guess, or can you use your home as a basis for all calculations? In my person scenario, it's extremely varied, sometimes I'll get a ping immediately, while other times, I will have driven 10+miles to get home while I wait for a ping.


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## turbovator (Aug 3, 2015)

me2dumb4college said:


> Turbo, how would you go about calculating this? There's no way that the IRS can know how many miles it took me to get a fare, but at the same time, I have no way to prove it took me whatever miles. Do you just operate under best guess, or can you use your home as a basis for all calculations? In my person scenario, it's extremely varied, sometimes I'll get a ping immediately, while other times, I will have driven 10+miles to get home while I wait for a ping.





me2dumb4college said:


> Turbo, how would you go about calculating this? There's no way that the IRS can know how many miles it took me to get a fare, but at the same time, I have no way to prove it took me whatever miles. Do you just operate under best guess, or can you use your home as a basis for all calculations? In my person scenario, it's extremely varied, sometimes I'll get a ping immediately, while other times, I will have driven 10+miles to get home while I wait for a ping.


It's the total miles on your vehicle while you where using it for business. You are not permitted to use personal use miles. The easiest way is to keep a daily log book of the business miles. Keep a running total so at the end of the year you have the total for the year. If the IRS questions the mileage total you have the daily log book to show them. 
BTW The average business miles is usually twice your actual paid trip miles. It's roughly one paid mile for every non paid mile. To and from, return empty trip miles and moving to location miles. If you use the 57.5 per mile deduction you can't your actual vehicle expenses. It's one or the other not both.


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## MAADSCIENTist (Sep 3, 2015)

Simon said:


> Beautiful! Nice Job! That is exactly what an Uber driver should be doing. Now with the above calcs lets do some more math...
> 
> Miles @ $.80 per mile minus 20%.
> 
> ...


Your Car is a Fat Liability! It never was design to make you money.. So the fact your taking that Liability and transforming it into a actual asset,.. Please factor that in.. #1 rule "Don't put value on Liabilities" So the hard earn dollars you was gonna spend towards your liability in the first place.. Your newly transformed asset pays for itself.. Please Calculate that in my brother..


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## Simon (Jan 4, 2015)

MAADSCIENTist said:


> Your Car is a Fat Liability! It never was design to make you money.. So the fact your taking that Liability and transforming it into a actual asset,.. Please factor that in.. #1 rule "Don't put value on Liabilities" So the hard earn dollars you was gonna spend towards your liability in the first place.. Your newly transformed asset pays for itself.. Please Calculate that in my brother..


Get a clue.. read this forum a bit before quoting people.


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## Bart McCoy (Nov 4, 2014)

the main problem here is that you're driving for $1.05/mile
just cant make good money at that rate



uberguy_in_ct said:


> They also take the 20% from per minute rate


um, they take 20% off the total fare. And of course the total fare includes the per min rate


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## me2dumb4college (Aug 27, 2015)

Bart McCoy said:


> the main problem here is that you're driving for $1.05/mile
> just cant make good money at that rate


I think what kills us the most is the safe rider fee being $1, which kills any profit on shorter trips. There's a $5 minimum here, and after the $1 SRF and 20% uber cut, you're at $3.20 minus all the varying expenses, plus dead time or miles driven to ping. You can very easily go negative on profit if you get stuck with a bunch of short $5 fares.



Bart McCoy said:


> um, they take 20% off the total fare. And of course the total fare includes the per min rate


Yes, he was just saying that I forgot to include that in my calculation, which I did.


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## Bart McCoy (Nov 4, 2014)

me2dumb4college said:


> I think what kills us the most is the safe rider fee being $1, which kills any profit on shorter trips. There's a $5 minimum here, and after the $1 SRF and 20% uber cut, you're at $3.20 minus all the varying expenses, plus dead time or miles driven to ping. You can very easily go negative on profit if you get stuck with a bunch of short $5 fares.
> 
> Yes, he was just saying that I forgot to include that in my calculation, which I did.


Same here in DC. DC is king of short trips. We are at $1.02/mile, just aint worth it

and I apologize to him then for the per min statement


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## flashgordonnc (Oct 24, 2014)

me2dumb4college said:


> Hi all,
> 
> First to introduce myself. I'm Justin and my Uber network is in the Richmond VA area. Current pricing structure is 1.05/mile and .18/min. I wanted to get a better understanding of what my actual costs are relative to the payout based on mileage.
> 
> ...


That's about right. After about a year of doing this, I average, with dead miles, waiting for a ping idle waiting time (even with engine off) you will average about $7-$10/hr gross before income taxes, and no benefits. And that is if I work mostly all the "supposed" peak hours.


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## max888 (Aug 17, 2015)

Simon said:


> Beautiful! Nice Job! That is exactly what an Uber driver should be doing. Now with the above calcs lets do some more math...
> 
> Miles @ $.80 per mile minus 20%.
> 
> ...


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## max888 (Aug 17, 2015)

Uber is Crappy for me always since last two months. They keeping hiring new drivers. we did not get enough rider all day, forget about surge.
I studied the surge phenomenon. This is really hilarious. There was surge when no rider was there. Even the taxis in that area were not getting rider. I watch it for 10 min. The surge was 2X. I was also online, did not get any ridar in that 10 min. None of the uber car get ridar in surge. Lol
In two months, I got only two time surge income that is 6 dollars. Lol.


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## max888 (Aug 17, 2015)

Yesterday, I drive 4 miles to pick up rider and drive around 8 miles which consume more than 25 min in that direction. I wait for 15 min to get rider in that area. But i did not get it. i drove back to home.

Total miles drove: 24 miles, 
Total hours: approx. 1 hour
Total money i got: $ 8.78

24 miles consume a gallon in down town...cost me 2.25 dollar.
Even i am not including my operating cost, I am getting 8.78 - 2.25=6.53 dollar for driving taxi for uber. This is not one time. it always like that since last two months.

Sometime ridar cancels the trip before you are just about to reach pick up location. We are getting nothing for those kind of rides even operating cost or gas cost.

I am demn sure, Uber will loose its drivers very soon. One company is coming soon with better business model with their physical presence for customer care service too. Drivers will go to that company obviously. Uber will b out of business very soon. God bless Uber for creating such hilarious business model for only consumer.


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## William1964 (Jul 28, 2015)

Why does a dead mile doubled his expense a mile is a mile whether it's dead or alive


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## flashgordonnc (Oct 24, 2014)

me2dumb4college said:


> Turbo, how would you go about calculating this? There's no way that the IRS can know how many miles it took me to get a fare, but at the same time, I have no way to prove it took me whatever miles. Do you just operate under best guess, or can you use your home as a basis for all calculations? In my person scenario, it's extremely varied, sometimes I'll get a ping immediately, while other times, I will have driven 10+miles to get home while I wait for a ping.


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## flashgordonnc (Oct 24, 2014)

It is all spelled out clearly on the IRS.gov website. The mileage records "must" be "contemporaneous". No more questions. Do your homework.


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## glados (May 23, 2015)

max888 said:


> Yesterday, I drive 4 miles to pick up rider and drive around 8 miles which consume more than 25 min in that direction. I wait for 15 min to get rider in that area. But i did not get it. i drove back to home.
> 
> Total miles drove: 24 miles,
> Total hours: approx. 1 hour
> ...


Wait 5 mins and then cancel.

As an IC you have the right to choose which jobs you take. Unless you're going in that direction anyway, don't take pings that are >10 minutes.


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## flashgordonnc (Oct 24, 2014)

William1964 said:


> Why does a dead mile doubled his expense a mile is a mile whether it's dead or alive


Just semantics my friend.
Dead miles reduce value of paid miles, or you can just count all miles as a cost (which they are). Your wallet does not know if you have a pax or freewheeling.
Happy Ubering.


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## flashgordonnc (Oct 24, 2014)

max888 said:


> Yesterday, I drive 4 miles to pick up rider and drive around 8 miles which consume more than 25 min in that direction. I wait for 15 min to get rider in that area. But i did not get it. i drove back to home.
> 
> Total miles drove: 24 miles,
> Total hours: approx. 1 hour
> ...


Uber "is" loosing drivers. Almost nobody does this full time, a driver lasts about four to twelve weeks avg.
There just happens to be be far more desperate people wanting to try driving than there are riders and a decent mileage rate to support them.


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## glados (May 23, 2015)

flashgordonnc said:


> Uber "is" loosing drivers. Almost nobody does this full time, a driver lasts about four to twelve weeks avg.
> There just happens to be be far more desperate people wanting to try driving than there are riders and a decent mileage rate to support them.


Turnover is present in every single business. There are many UberX drivers who have been driving since the inception of UberX!


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## Doc Nyto (Sep 16, 2015)

I don't understand the value in staying home til you are pinged unless your home is in high needs area. The Uber drivers I know locally take their car to some high Uber use area ... near hotels, hospitals, airport, ... park and wait for pings. One guy I know, and I've seen his payment on ap makes about $500 on days he works it f/t ... 8 hrs or so.


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## me2dumb4college (Aug 27, 2015)

Doc Nyto said:


> I don't understand the value in staying home til you are pinged unless your home is in high needs area. The Uber drivers I know locally take their car to some high Uber use area ... near hotels, hospitals, airport, ... park and wait for pings. One guy I know, and I've seen his payment on ap makes about $500 on days he works it f/t ... 8 hrs or so.


Usually the pings, despite being few and far between, in the suburbs tend to equate to a larger fare and will most likely bring me into the city anyways. If I need to do household chores anyways, then it makes sense to just turn on the app and go about my business until I get that first ping.


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## sk MM (Jul 27, 2015)

me2dumb4college said:


> I think what kills us the most is the safe rider fee being $1, which kills any profit on shorter trips. There's a $5 minimum here, and after the $1 SRF and 20% uber cut, you're at $3.20 minus all the varying expenses, plus dead time or miles driven to ping. You can very easily go negative on profit if you get stuck with a bunch of short $5 fares.
> 
> Yes, he was just saying that I forgot to include that in my calculation, which I did.


I had couple of trips less than $3. $2.40, $2.73, $2.89 and more. less than mile and 5-7 mins ride are not worth it.


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## 1LIFE (Aug 24, 2015)

It's a taxi gig... Uber is just giving the average person a way to get a taxi job. There's nothing life changing about a taxi job. Except you realize how many times you need to find a bathroom in a 5 to 8 hour period of time. LOL

The average (full time) taxi drivers annual wages is somewhere between $25,000 to $30,000. (this is probably on the high end.)

Uber radio commercials always have a guy named "Lawrence" saying... "If you wanna go out and make $200 a day, you can, if you wanna make $500 a day... it's up to you!" ... LOL so many people drink that Uber Kewl-Aid and sign up.

It would drive me crazy to try to figure out exactly how much my tires, headlights, transmission, turn-signals, brakes cost per mile... LOL ... not gonna do that...

IRS says $0.575 per mile to operate my vehicle... that's how much it costs, keep track in a log book of business miles... and it's deductible from your taxes at the end of the year.

Be smart about it... put a percentage away into reserve or emergency account for repairs or maintenance. (these expenses are NOT deductible because they are included within the $0.575 mile deductions.)

If you drive 100 miles in a day for your business (alive and dead miles combined doesn't matter)... that's $57.50 you get to deduct from taxes... and if you only made $50.00 for the day... guess what... you operated at a Loss that day according to the IRS. Good enough.

The goal is to show/prove to the IRS that you legitimately operated at a loss for the year... so you owe $0.00 in taxes, or as little in taxes as possible. (one of the perks to owning and operating your own business.)

Make sure you get your states business license and UBI # in order to file your taxes.


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## Claw Dogs (Jul 7, 2015)

1LIFE said:


> It's a taxi gig... Uber is just giving the average person a way to get a taxi job. There's nothing life changing about a taxi job. Except you realize how many times you need to find a bathroom in a 5 to 8 hour period of time. LOL
> 
> The average (full time) taxi drivers annual wages is somewhere between $25,000 to $30,000. (this is probably on the high end.)
> 
> ...


LOL, you are right about Laurence. I laughed when I heard that commercial. You can make $500 in a day if you work 24 hrs, non-stop, without eating or using a restroom perhaps on a busy Friday. But even then it's not likely.. After that, deduct mileage, gas, taxes etc..


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## 1LIFE (Aug 24, 2015)

Claw Dogs said:


> LOL, you are right about Laurence. I laughed when I heard that commercial. You can make $500 in a day if you work 24 hrs, non-stop, without eating or using a restroom perhaps on a busy Friday. But even then it's not likely.. After that, deduct mileage, gas, taxes etc..


I hear that commercial twice per hour every day. As a result, on weekends there are 100-150 drivers on the road at all times in my market... and they are angry cuz Uber said they could make $200-$500 a day... LOL!


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## SCdave (Jun 27, 2014)

1LIFE said:


> It's a taxi gig... Uber is just giving the average person a way to get a taxi job. There's nothing life changing about a taxi job. Except you realize how many times you need to find a bathroom in a 5 to 8 hour period of time. LOL
> 
> The average (full time) taxi drivers annual wages is somewhere between $25,000 to $30,000. (this is probably on the high end.)
> 
> ...


Good post except re deduct business expense like " food and snacks". If the food is for yourself, you cannot deduct the cost.

Exception would be if you took a business lunch with someone else and paid the bill and kept the receipt. Or you bought the "food and/or snacks" for your passengers. Both of these would be "cost of doing business".

Just wanted to point this out since, again, good post but some drivers may think that they can use daily food and snacks "they eat" as a tax deduction. This is not a cost of doing business.

* I'm not a CPA or Accountant. If there is one on this thread, please clarify for all of us.


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## flashgordonnc (Oct 24, 2014)

Doc Nyto said:


> I don't understand the value in staying home til you are pinged unless your home is in high needs area. The Uber drivers I know locally take their car to some high Uber use area ... near hotels, hospitals, airport, ... park and wait for pings. One guy I know, and I've seen his payment on ap makes about $500 on days he works it f/t ... 8 hrs or so.


Do the math in reverse using the mileage rate and 50% of the time adding the time rate (about .18/min) as Uber charges "both" when on a fare. It cannot be done unless he is Flash Gordon, both on the ping and between fares.


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## 1LIFE (Aug 24, 2015)

SCdave said:


> Good post except re deduct business expense like " food and snacks". If the food is for yourself, you cannot deduct the cost.
> 
> Exception would be if you took a business lunch with someone else and paid the bill and kept the receipt. Or you bought the "food and/or snacks" for your passengers. Both of these would be "cost of doing business".
> 
> ...


Thanks SCDave,

You may be right about that. I'll definitely investigate more about that. (I edited to delete that paragraph.)


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## William1964 (Jul 28, 2015)

Yeah I was thinking about this stuff again. And was running a few numbers based on 60,000 miles a year. Car 2014 Chevy Cruze. Driver with good credit

Gas $0.109/mile
Ins .016
Dep .054
Tire .008
Tune .004
Brake .012
Oil .008
Wash .012
Clean .006
Check .01
Phone .008
Plates .003
Car .072
Misc .005
Legal .012

The depreciation is kind of difficult the car value went down 4900 over 18 months I use the car to deliver pizzas with a w2 form. I can claim two thirds of 4900

While it's disturbing my benchmark is less debt and more money in the bank on January one then I did the previous January one. I don't feel the depreciation. 

Even at $18,000 a year if I Drive 60000 miles for work or business the mileage deduction will be more than the expenses the mileage deduction will be more inexpensive and will reduce my tax which is a positive


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## Contrarian75 (Oct 20, 2015)

Is anyone tracking their mileage from their driveway to back to driveway and multiplying that mileage with $0.575 (2015 deduction allowance) as their cost basis? Recently I started to keep track that way and the number for the last 4 days are like this: I drove 525 miles over 4 days, got paid $334. Take out the cost, which equates to $302, which leaves me $32.16 for driving 25.5 hours. Tracking it that my average pay turns out to be $1.26/hour. Am I missing something?
By the way, I drive in the Charlotte area as UberX, where min fare is 5.65, (1.10 base fare, 0.16/min + $1.oo/mile), 1.65 SRF


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## Uber SUCKS for drivers! (Jan 1, 2015)

me2dumb4college said:


> Hi all,
> 
> First to introduce myself. I'm Justin and my Uber network is in the Richmond VA area. Current pricing structure is 1.05/mile and .18/min. I wanted to get a better understanding of what my actual costs are relative to the payout based on mileage.
> 
> ...


Yeah, just depreciation alone is like $.30/mile on a decent new car. You completely ignored 50% dead miles, so cut your profit figures in half. You are lucky to still be at $1.05 (which is still shitty) most major cities are at $.75/mile. Yeah, you can only do this now in a 10 year old beater. The product has gone to hell, and nobody is really making any money. Here's my painful math: $.75 x 80% = $.60/mile x 50% (dead miles) = $.30/mile - $.57/mile op cost on my new car = LOSE ... -$.27/mile! What idiots are talking about taxes??? Another idiot just posted that he is "happy with the pay", what pay? There is no pay! Lose a little on every trip, but make it up on volume! STOP THE INSANITY!


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## Uber SUCKS for drivers! (Jan 1, 2015)

Contrarian75 said:


> Is anyone tracking their mileage from their driveway to back to driveway and multiplying that mileage with $0.575 (2015 deduction allowance) as their cost basis? Recently I started to keep track that way and the number for the last 4 days are like this: I drove 525 miles over 4 days, got paid $334. Take out the cost, which equates to $302, which leaves me $32.16 for driving 25.5 hours. Tracking it that my average pay turns out to be $1.26/hour. Am I missing something?
> By the way, I drive in the Charlotte area as UberX, where min fare is 5.65, (1.10 base fare, 0.16/min + $1.oo/mile), 1.65 SRF


Nope, you got it right, you are doing this for free!
Sure hope you're having fun though! Lol
You are lucky to still be at $1/mile (which is still shitty) most major cities are at $.75/mile!


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## Uber SUCKS for drivers! (Jan 1, 2015)

me2dumb4college said:


> Hey Aw Jeez, thanks for reading.  So most insurance plans are based on a 6 month or year payment. To calculate cost for that on a mile basis, you'd need to estimate how ever many miles you plan to drive, which using your 50k miles per year, that would be a very low cost per mile, my guess is not even a cent, but at most a few cents. Lot of factors including driving record come into play there, but I think you may be over-estimating cost of insurance.
> 
> As for net, as you can see in my calculations, I'm already at .63/mile, factoring in insurance, dead miles, and return miles, you could probably make the case that my net is slightly less, like in the upper .50s?
> 
> A few others things, like surges and tips that I cannot include in the calculations.


NO, dead miles dont just bring you down a "little bit" into "the upper $.50's" bonehead, they take a full 50%, and put you down to $.30/mile! Insurance is not a factor to be included, that is a fixed cost.


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## PHXTE (Jun 23, 2015)

Contrarian75 said:


> Is anyone tracking their mileage from their driveway to back to driveway and multiplying that mileage with $0.575 (2015 deduction allowance) as their cost basis? Recently I started to keep track that way and the number for the last 4 days are like this: I drove 525 miles over 4 days, got paid $334. Take out the cost, which equates to $302, which leaves me $32.16 for driving 25.5 hours. Tracking it that my average pay turns out to be $1.26/hour. Am I missing something?
> By the way, I drive in the Charlotte area as UberX, where min fare is 5.65, (1.10 base fare, 0.16/min + $1.oo/mile), 1.65 SRF


Yeah, you are. The 57.5 cents is an arbitrary number the IRS calculates for tax purposes. Your real expenses are probably a lot less than that, so I'm sure you're making more than that.


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## Einstein (Oct 10, 2015)

PHXTE said:


> Yeah, you are. The 57.5 cents is an arbitrary number the IRS calculates for tax purposes. Your real expenses are probably a lot less than that, so I'm sure you're making more than that.


Every vehicle has a different factor. That's why there is such varied opinion about the average driver net earnings.


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## Uber SUCKS for drivers! (Jan 1, 2015)

PHXTE said:


> Yeah, you are. The 57.5 cents is an arbitrary number the IRS calculates for tax purposes. Your real expenses are probably a lot less than that, so I'm sure you're making more than that.


A newer vehichle does cost the full $.575/mile, and you lose money at this. If you drive a beater, then you can break even, but no one is actually "making money". You may be getting deposits, but you are just borrowing money from ur car, not "earning a wage".


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## Aw Jeez (Jul 13, 2015)

Look, it's not that complicated! There's a lot of arguing over what a car costs to operate. It is "something," right? No car operates for free. Some costs-per-mile can be known, others have to be educated estimates. For instance, fuel. If your car gets 17 mpg as mine does and gas in your city is $2.25 then your (my) gas costs are $0.13/mile ($2.25 divided by 17). You can know this with certainty. Same with tires. If your tires last 50,000 miles and they cost $800 per set, then ($800 divided by 50,000) your tires cost you $0.016/mile. 

So you ask, "Are you serious? You're figuring things to a penny-and-a-half cent per mile?" Well sure. Because those pennies add up. We're already at $0.145 (fourteen and a half cents) per mile and we haven't even figured in the cost of oil changes, brakes, insurance or unscheduled repairs. Or...do you think your car will never break? You *have* to set aside money for repairs. And remember, when your car is in the shop YOU ARE NOT MAKING ANY MONEY.

Insurance *must* be factored in. You *must* have insurance on your car whether you are driving for Uber or not. That insurance does not stop just because you're on Uber's clock. So you take the entire number of miles you drive in a year (might have to be an estimate) and divide that into your insurance cost. In aviation, when figuring out how much an aircraft costs to operate, things like fuel go under "direct operating cost." The cost-per-hour of insurance depends on how many hours you fly the plane, right? Same with the car. The cost-per-mile of your insurance depends on how many miles you drive. It's a variable. But it still must be calculated. In my case I pay $3,600 per year for commercial insurance. If I drive 50,000, my insurance cost-per-mile is $0.072 (seven cents per mile). If I drive 40,000 my insurance is $0.09/mile. Makes a difference!

At $0.13/mile, fuel is my biggest expense. I figure it costs me $0.29/mile to run my car...twenty-nine cents per mile. Do the math and your numbers will probably be pretty close. My car is paid-for and fully depreciated.

So. The taxi meter rate in my town is $2.25/mile. But considering that virtually all of my trips are one-way (it's a weird city), my *total* per-mile rate ("dead" and revenue miles) works out to be about $1.00: one lousy dollar per mile. That means, if the car costs me $0.29/mile and I'm making $1.00/mile, then I'm only earning $0.71/mile. If I drive 4,000 miles in a given month, I can figure I'll spend $1,160 in gas and expenses on the car. I *better* have made $4,000 in fares. And that's about how it works out.

Let's talk taxes if you must. 4,000 miles per month should gross me $44,000/year for 44,000 miles. From that I can deduct the IRS vehicle allowance of $.575/mile - let's say $25,300. This lowers my adjusted gross income to $18,700. Minus the other personal deductions/exemptions, my taxable income is quite small.

There are many things that go into the cost-per-mile equation of a particular vehicle. If you drive for money, you MUST calculate how much your car actually costs you to operate it. Only then can you determine how much you're *really* making doing this. I suspect that the real numbers will be pretty shocking.


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## Uber SUCKS for drivers! (Jan 1, 2015)

Aw Jeez said:


> Look, it's not that complicated! There's a lot of arguing over what a car costs to operate. It is "something," right? No car operates for free. Some costs-per-mile can be known, others have to be educated estimates. For instance, fuel. If your car gets 17 mpg as mine does and gas in your city is $2.25 then your (my) gas costs are $0.13/mile ($2.25 divided by 17). You can know this with certainty. Same with tires. If your tires last 50,000 miles and they cost $800 per set, then ($800 divided by 50,000) your tires cost you $0.016/mile.
> 
> So you ask, "Are you serious? You're figuring things to a penny-and-a-half cent per mile?" Well sure. Because those pennies add up. We're already at $0.145 (fourteen and a half cents) per mile and we haven't even figured in the cost of oil changes, brakes, insurance or unscheduled repairs. Or...do you think your car will never break? You *have* to set aside money for repairs. And remember, when your car is in the shop YOU ARE NOT MAKING ANY MONEY.
> 
> ...


So, you dont drive Uber, you are a regular cab driver? Or, why do you mention the $2.25 cab rate? If you were driving UberX, you would only gross $.40/mile with 50% dead miles, and only net 11 cents/mile, or $4,800/year! (There is no such thing as "fully depreciated", unless your car is 30 years old lol)


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## Aw Jeez (Jul 13, 2015)

"Uber SUCKS" that is my point. The car WILL cost you X-cents/mile. What Uber drivers have to realize is that if their car costs them, say, $0.20/mile (if they're lucky) and they're only generating $0.60/mile (or whatever), their margins are very thin. I've looked into switching over to Uber in my town, but right now the numbers don't work.


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## Doc Nyto (Sep 16, 2015)

Just curious ... if you were working in a 9 to 5 rut job would you calculate your day from the moment you leave your driveway til the time you roll back from your commute? Doubt your employer will pay you for the commute ... that's just dead heading. And of course in a brick & morter job you can rarely deduct cost of gasoline and other car expenses from your yearly tax filing. But you can deduct it on your Schedule C.

Since its basically your own business, you can use Schedule C for filing taxes and can write off so much of these expenses.

The key is to NOT compare this to the hourly laborer paradigm but to small business ownership. Consider all this "overhead."

If you can't conceptualize it that way, Uber probably isn't a good option for you. I've always owned lots of my own small businesses and this fits beautifully into that paradigm.


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## Doc Nyto (Sep 16, 2015)

Claw Dogs said:


> LOL, you are right about Laurence. I laughed when I heard that commercial. You can make $500 in a day if you work 24 hrs, non-stop, without eating or using a restroom perhaps on a busy Friday. But even then it's not likely.. After that, deduct mileage, gas, taxes etc..


Depends. In towns like mine, where yesterday there were 2 major college football games, Parents Weekend, Halloween, an Opera, and all kinds of festivals, some drivers I know were making $200/hr on constant surge. I didn't want to work the surge traffic but still made a nice weekly figure on minimal milage.


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## IckyDoody (Sep 18, 2015)

Doc Nyto said:


> Just curious ... if you were working in a 9 to 5 rut job would you calculate your day from the moment you leave your driveway til the time you roll back from your commute? Doubt your employer will pay you for the commute ... that's just dead heading. And of course in a brick & morter job you can rarely deduct cost of gasoline and other car expenses from your yearly tax filing. But you can deduct it on your Schedule C.
> 
> Since its basically your own business, you can use Schedule C for filing taxes and can write off so much of these expenses.
> 
> ...


Lol at you telling the guy who actually understands the costs of driving a car "you just don't get it". Jeez is right, If you drive for profit then you need to know how much it costs you to drive your vehicle. And not this "well, I already had the car and it's already depreciating so even If I drive 5 times as many miles as I normally would, it's only costing me %10 extra" bullshit. bullshit. bullshit. Driving cost is measured in cost per mile. *Each mile that you spend ubering has a cost! *If you don't know your cost per mile then you have no clue what your true profit is. If you don't know what your profit is, then you can't know how much your tax situation is benefiting you.

For me, it costs an estimated 25 cents a mile to drive, 11 cents of that is maintenance and depreciation. I uber 60 hours a week. I net (true net, not earnings) $10 per hour. *In order to know that net hourly, I must know my hours, earnings and costs.* I log each mile that I drive in pursuit of money. I log each hour I spend in pursuit of money. If I have the app on when I leave my home and I am ready to accept requests, then those miles and hours are logged. If I'm driving home with the app off, those miles and hours are not logged. I owe zero income taxes, I owe about $100 per month in SE taxes. I qualify for free obamacare. Each month, that 11 cents per mile in maintenance and depreciation adds up to over $500.

Now you are getting an idea of how to truly see the big picture. I make 10 bucks an hour in what is essentially a menial labor joe job. I get a healthy tax and insurance benefits that I wouldn't get in a normal joe job. I can also work many more hours than I could if I was working a joe job. If I wanted to work this much at a joe job, I would need to get two jobs and juggle their schedules.

Basically, if you uber well and use the right (old) car, then it's better than a minimum wage joe job.


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## Doc Nyto (Sep 16, 2015)

Yes, good to know how much it's costing you. I purchased a good, low milage Lexus to use specifically for my small Uber business and like the other small businesses I own and operate, I do keep track of everything. And I consult with my accountant since I have multiple businesses. And I make a very strong Uber profit on 20 to 30 hours a week ... mostly daytime hours, 6 a.m. to 3 p.m.

However, if you continually compare Uber to an HOURLY grind gig, you'll be eternally unhappy and my suggestion it may not be ideal for you is the comparison to grind jobs rather than to owning a brick & morter business with traditional overhead.

The expenses you list are reality. But in any personally owned business you will have them. I do have several online businesses that require minimal overhead so if the overhead costs to have your own Uber business are frustrating you, an online business where you can stay home in pajamas basically just has the computer and high speed wifi overhead.


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## TheUnEmployedAndSinking (Jan 25, 2016)

Would like some information, if you wouldn't mind. Some of you actually know what you're doing.

I was wondering what apps that would assist me in complying with the IRS?

Many Thanks!


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## Bart McCoy (Nov 4, 2014)

TheUnEmployedAndSinking said:


> Would like some information, if you wouldn't mind. Some of you actually know what you're doing.
> 
> I was wondering what apps that would assist me in complying with the IRS?
> 
> Many Thanks!


I mean its a lil late for tax year 2015 but try TripLog


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