When I did some research I found that few personal finance experts consider cars to be a budget buster. In fact, looking at vehicles and their expenses even momentarily reveals a number of places for your money to disappear. I’ll categorize them:

Ownership: Did you borrow for your car? Unless you have a 0.00% APR deal, borrowing money for a car is costing you interest. This interest is compounding while you’re paying the loan. Your $20,000 car will probably cost you about $24,000-$26,000 using the average interest rate for a new car. Consider driving a car that you can afford to buy in cash or consider putting a lot of cash down for your next one.

Operation: Are you driving around with low air pressure in your tires? Low tires reduce your gas mileage by a bunch. Is your air filter dirty? Air filters help with your mileage as well. After reading an article advising women about car maintenance, I learned that older cars sometimes need fuel injectors cleaned as well. Clean fuel injectors can help gas mileage.  To summarize, keeping your car in good shape helps it to run efficiently and economically.

Storage or Parking: If you live in a large city, you likely pay for parking at home, at the office, or sometimes both. Consider using public transportation if you can during the week and use your vehicle only on the weekends. You’ll save the gasoline money and the parking money.

Insurance: If you have a decent amount of money in savings and drive an older car that has no loan, consider self-insuring the physical damage coverage for your car (”Comprehensive and Collision”). This may be scary, but if you have enough cash to buy another car and your car isn’t worth much to begin with, it might be a smart idea. Another insurance mistake is not insuring your home and auto insurance with the same insurance carrier. There are almost always discounts for putting them together and insurers covet the home and auto combination.

I know all the little things that can eat at your pocketbook, and the reason I know is because I have done them all. Yes, I admit it, I’ve done everything I listed and paid the price. I’m still not perfect, but I have learned to avoid these little fees that add up over the year. Some of the fees are actually a bit larger, and can cause your APR to increase, your payment to increase, or have some other fee imposed on your account.

Most of the items are small, and don’t seem like they would impact your budget in a negative way if they just occur once a week or a couple of times a month. Most of us don’t think about the number of occurrences that happen because the fee is small, or the amount is minuscule compared to other items in our budget. All the little things add up, and can make an impact on your budget.

Late Credit Card Payment – I know that we’re not supposed to have these except for emergencies, but life does happen and we end up with a credit card. Mailing the credit card payment in late will cost you an average of $25.90 each month for a total of $310.80 for an entire year.

DVD Late Rental Fee – Redbox has a late fee of $1.00 per day and Blockbuster Stores have a restocking fee of $1.25 if the movie is returned within 30 days of rental. Cost for one late movie a week for an entire year, $52.

ATM Fees – This is my favorite fee since it’s been around for so long. Many banks have done away with ATM fees if you use their ATMs, but if you’re in an area where your bank’s ATM is not accessible you’ll need to access cash at a cost. Average cost of an ATM fee $1.64, if accessed just once a week that is $85.28 for an entire year.

Gasoline – Send your kids on the bus. You’re paying for the gasoline the school district purchases for the bus anyway in your property taxes. Sending our kids on the bus saves us about $40 a year.

Bouncing a check – Oh, the dreaded check bounce. We all know that if one check bounces it sends our poor little checking account into a downward spiral as the checks keep coming in and bouncing away. Bounce one check a month for an average of $28.95 each time and that’s $347.40 a year.

Those were just five little ways to watch your pocketbook be slowly drained over the year. The sad thing is, that those aren’t the only ways for it to happen. Pay close attention to everything you do, including the tiny little library fees that you pay each month because after all, it’s only $3 in late fees this month. For the five little things above, the small price is $835.48.