One car or two?

We have considered this as Mr F rarely uses his car during the week, perhaps one evening and then im in the house so he could use mine. He cycles to and from work everyday whereas I drive and has a 3 door sportier number compared to my 5door sensible car..but i like the idea of having my OWN car, that ive paid for, and yes its selfish but i worked hard for it.

if youve managed for 6weeeks i dont see it as being a problem...

One car for us.

H won't drive (he can, he just won't) and we both commute to work on the train.

Sometimes I don't use it for a fortnight!

We manage with none!

We have none, but we do get public transport to work. I'd like one, but it's not financially feasible at the moment. We would probably cope fine with one.

You work with your H too which I imagine would make it easier to share? My parents need one each, as they work in opposite directions, have different working hours and need cars during the day to make visits to patients. H's parents have two, but only ever use one at a time (MIL, like AC's H, can drive but won't unless necessary or it's a very short trip to Waitrose). They've got the big one for long-distance and moving their kids to uni etc and a small one for short trips.

We have two but have no other option.

It would take me nearly three hours to get to my work on public transport and because he works shifts, public transport doesn't run when he needs it.

We have two cars and a Harley Davidson.

We have to have 1 each due to both using them every day for work (and there is no other way of getting to work that isn't utterly ridiculous)

However, I think we will *always* have 2 regardless of jobs etc, we've got used to it and I would hate the lack of independance.

But, if you don't use them both every day and you've managed for 6 weeks I'd suggest you could probably do with just 1, and then maybe if finances pick up again in the future treat yourself to a 2nd again.

Good point Saisi - should have mentioned that not only do we work together, we also live right across the road from the office, so it wouldn't even matter if one of us needed to be in earlier or later than the other.

Nutella - that's what I thought, as we've always had the two, but since surviving on one, it's been ok. Having said that, having been so busy planning stuff for the home party, he hasn't been going off to football, going away for weekends etc, so I might give things a few weeks to settle back down and see how we get on.

We have one. H works in Liverpool, in a part which isn't easy to get to on Public Transport. Plus he gets free parking on a secure car park.

I can technically walk to / from work, but I usually cabbage a lift off my Dad. If I need to go out during the day, either a colleague takes me (if they're also going there) or by borrowing my dad's car.

We need 2, have talked about just sharing one as a 'family car' but it wouldn't work. I wouldn't want to be without one when OH is at far-flung away matches and equally when I go off for my mad gay weekends he would be trapped locally if I had the car.

My H can't drive and will never be able to, so we have no choice. We make it work thought, whether it means him going to work an hour early so he can get a lift off me, or me going in an hour early so that I can drop him off in time for his shift.

We work in different places, but his is en route to mine ?

If you live just over the road from yours then there's your answer!

My parents also have 2 cars but work in the same place (not walking difference) so for them having 2 cars is really not a necessity but my dad insists on having his own!

We have recently swapped from 2 cars, to one car.

We live on the army camp that H works on, and I live an hours commute from work so I have to have the car every week day without fail.

The times we've found it an inconvinence so far are:

* When H was sent down south on a course, and had no transport, work only provide it to get there, and back and it was a 4 week course but he wasn't working weekends, he managed to get a lift back up, albeit it at £60 a week

* When H in on annual leave and I am at work - he is confined to the house / reliant on lifts from friends

* I can't ask H to run errands for me while i'm at work as he has no transport. Eg: Going to the bank/pot office etc.

* When we both want to do something seperate on a weekend. Eg I've commited to visiting my parents in a few weeks, and he wants to go and see his while I am with my Mom, usually we'd both take cars as my parents live 20mins apart at home so need to get between them, and it's an hour and half from my parents to his. As it is, we've now had to arrange that he drives me to my Moms, my dad comes and visits me at my nans (his moms) nearby and my H takes the car on to his parents.

So the above is all a bit of a faff, but can work if you plan /are willing to compromie and go out your way a little. Though we sometimes spend more as a result of having only one car eg: on lifts/taxi's - it stilll works out cheaper for us.

Two out of need really. Hubby does a 35 mile round trip everyday for work and I need mine for business as well as supermarket, docs, dentist and such like.

We have 4 cars. 3 of them belong to hubby, but only 2 of the 3 are road worthy. There is no way we could cope without having a car each, even though I can walk to work I do sometimes need my car for work to do house visits, and often at short notice, ie I have to go back home to collect it. Plus I like having my own car and I don't like driving Hubby's car if I can help it.

We have two cars and OH has a work van. He is only able to use his van for commuting to and from work and during work hour (It has a tracker on it). We are in the process of looking for a 'family' bigger car, I have a corsa and he has a 3 door 2L turbo sport astra. We will then get rid of them both and have just the one car as he rarely uses his!

2. H is a contractor and could be a couple of hours away for work so needs his. My work is 6 1/2 miles away and I (pre maternity leave) split driving and cycling. More driving inthe winter- on icy or snowy days cycling is dangerous. Now I'm home every day and technically could manage without a car, but it would restrict what I do a lot.

We have 2. H works split shifts and there isn't a regular enough bus service to get me to and from work.

We have one car.

I walk to and from work, O/H will also cycle here and there. We are also lucky that family are close by so their is always plenty of scope for a lift if ever desperate! Plus working on t'railway we use the trains alot due to free travel hehe.

If you have managed without for 6 weeks I would say keep going and just have the one, the money you save just put aside incase you change your minds and then that could go towards a little run around maybe?!

We have 3 cars and 2 motorbikes ?. My commute is 50 mile trip though so we couldn't have just one. As for the others blame my H.

We used to have 2 cars but mine died about 2 months ago. I borrow OHs but he needs it for work and he works for himslef weekends. It has started really getting to me. I only need a little run around as he has a nearly new astra. I really want a new car and I am still looking. It's getting more annoying since the weather turned too.

I would much rather have 2 cars than one.

We have one old banger which the boy uses to get to work, I commute into town so I don't need a car. Been mooching about on recruitment sites lately though and have found the fact that we only have one car really limits my choice

We have 2 cars. 1 is a work horse for school and airport runs, shopping and general use. we also have a convertible we use on nice days and formal outings, OH uses it if I have the other car.

We have two cars as we need them to get to work and drop off the 3 kids at school and nursery. Then on the days OH is in work and I'm at home, I need the car to get around with the kids.

My friend who lives near us manages with one car for the family - her, OH and 2 children. Her OH can walk over to get a bus to work, her eldest son gets the bus to comp and the youngest is at primary school in walking distance so they can work around most situations.

Having spent £100s recently on my car (repairs, tax, MOT, service, tyres), I would say if you can manage with one then stick with one. Better for the environment too if you can cut down on journeys and walk when you can.

We have one, but we both use public transport to work, and live in London so it's not needed much. If we lived out in the countryside (which is part of my Grand Life Plan) then we'd probably need 2.

Thanks for your opinions everyone. We have managed with one for 6 weeks, but like I said, we've been spending a lot of time together doing stuff for our blessing/party, so he hasn't been going off to football etc where he might take the car for the whole day.

Perhaps we'll get one nice one and keep one banger!

We only have the one car.

Monday to Wednesday I work in town, so I cycle to and from work those days. OH works a half hour - 45min drive away, so he has the car. On Thursdays when I work at our other campus, I take the car and OH either uses his scooter, catches the bus or works from home, depending on the weather and how much he's got on! Fridays I'm not at work so OH has the car again.

Weekends are more complicated as OH runs a Sunday League team he needs to cart kit etc around for, plus I frequently travel to my sister's up North - I can usually get the train but sometimes I need to take the car.

Don't think we could cope with the cost of two cars! I do miss having more independence though.

We have two. I work shifts and wouldn't fancy the train at 10pm in Liverpool city centre. OH works on the outskirts of Liverpool and it takes about 40 minutes to get there anyway so he would never do it on public transport. Plus, if he had the car I'd go insane not having one to use

We used to have a car each as I used to work in Leeds and H worked in York, but since I was made redundant and had our little boy we exchanged both cars for just the one as H now has a new job working locally and has his works van parked outside the house. It doesn't cause any problems us having one car as I use the car most of the time and H drives it at the weekend.

We're 2 cars, but we're near enough in the middle of no where in a village, near a market town. Public transport is shocking!

We couldnt get to work without our cars, to the point my car had to be in the garage overnight last week - I had to get up with OH so I could get a lift to be dropped off at the nearest train station 15mins before I should have even been getting out of bed to get ready for work! This is with the dog as well. Then had to get OH's parents to pick me and the dog up from the train station and I then got to work like that. Total nightmare! And being we work shifts, it would have been worse had we not had similar shifts at that time (as in, both starting early mornings, just OH started at 7, I started at 8 - so yes, I was at the train station at 6.30am!). Plus, at £7.70 for a return ticket for a 10-15min journey before the petrol money to get to the train station, its soooo expensive! I can drive to work and back for about £4 a day!

Buses are also useless. Earliest bus in the morning would arrive at about 9am, and last bus home leaves the town I work in at 3.30 - and there is only like 2 other trip in the whole day! So, I cant go by bus if I want to work full time!