Monday, July 24, 2017

The New Normal: Living with a "almost $0 gas" budget

For people like me growing up during the Cold war years,  gas prices only went low like this once before.  Many of us thought we wouldn't see them this low again especially during the $4 /gal gas of the GW Bush era.  Yet today I sit here, realizing i was too young to know how to react to the low gas prices that we saw in (was it the late 80s or early 90s).  Heck I didn't even own a car back then. 

Today i realize there "could be" a new normal.  -considering a gas credit card in these low prices?  -still using gas coupons from your local grocery store to get up to $1.50/ gal off?  well,  if you budget,  it seems possible to achieve close to free gas.  Like I said, i thought this day would never come.

A grocery store chain about 200 miles from me advertises $1.50 / gal off of gas when you buy about $100 of groceries .  Yes, of course, "there's no such thing as a free lunch".  But there is now a thing for the soccer mom who paid $100 a week for groceries for her family.  Ladies and Gentleman
"free gas is possible"  in some places. 

case in point:  you find a grocery store with the $1.50 or even just $1/gal off.  step 1:  fully using this sytem.  It's pretty easy to use the gas coupons once you get the hang of it.  step 2:  seems that there are a few of the older gas stations offering 5 cents/gallon or even 10 cents/gallon off when you use  a gas credit card through Shell, Exxon Mobil,  and possibly Visa.  This has been around for quite some time and was very valuable during the high gas price era.  BUT NOW if you , yes you, want to achieve "free gas"  well and you live in , say, Minneapolis you can do this math:
$2.19 /gal gas price as of July 2017
-$1.50/gal gas when shopping at Cub foods
-.10/gal gas when using a gas credit card
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59 cents/gallon is what you have to spend.  I think with enough time, i could seriously get the price down to about 5 dollars for a 15 gallon tank of gas.  Sure that's not entirely free but it's quite amazing,,,
quite amazing that we can achieve this.  Now,  in the summer of 2017.