It’s mid-week and my wife & I have been busy at work. Given the way things are going, I guess we should count ourselves fortunate we still have work to do and a job to go to? Haha. Oh well, we just have to take it one step at a time.
I read Mr.WealthMachine’s recent post on: How much did I make driving Uber for 1 week? I also read his previous post on him driving Uber for the past few weeks. Great stuff!
First up, I am sorry to hear about the terrible graduate employment market. I have an intern who joined our team a few weeks ago in his penultimate year of university and mentioned how his girlfriend who just graduated is struggling to find a job as well.
I reckon it does depend on the course you studied at university and the industry sector/firm you are looking to join. Sadly, the accounting industry is always looking for fresh graduates because the burnout rate is so high. But it’s a good place to start your career if you have no idea what to work as because of the nature and transferability of the skills you will pick up.
I graduated in 2009 from Melbourne University (Australia) in the aftermath of the 2007/2008 Global Financial Crisis. So I know and understand a little about how crappy a bad graduate employment market can be. It’s frustrating because you will most likely not end up starting in any of your preferred jobs but instead have to route around using other jobs to gain experience. This will cost you time and money while taking up additional effort to get through it.
Having gone through it myself, I don’t envy what’s about to happen to you if things don’t improve. I would like to say it made me tougher but that’s only because I survived it. Back then, the gig economy wasn’t anywhere near what it is today. Which is why Uber continues to be a source of fascination for me. Just imagine, tapping into your free time and driving license to earn what I think (based on Mr.WealthMachine’s posts) is a reliable source of weekly income.
By the way, the costs and earnings information on his blog is useful in gauging your possible net weekly income driving Uber as a beginner and going forward. From what I can see, your take-home earnings can hit S$700 each week after taking into account the various costs and incentives. This is assuming you don’t fall sick and drive consistently almost every day.
Now for the fun part. How would I apply his data to my situation if I have to drive Uber after getting retrenched? The entire section below is based on my simplistic predictions and estimates on what might happen.
Actions taken and assumptions
Firstly, I will borrow my parents-in-law’s second car. I know it’s cheating but desperate times will call for desperate measures. Plus I already drive it every weekend to get us around so I’m familiar with it. Secondly, I will only drive it for my normal work week and hours i.e. Mon to Fri 9am to 7pm if my wife is still working. Still not desperate enough to burn my weekend and will rather spend the time with my wife, family and friends. If my wife is retrenched as well, haha, then maybe she can be my relief driver?
Month 1 as new driver with bonus and incentive
Total Average Weekly Earnings – S$800
Average daily trips: 12
Average weekly trips: 12 * 5 = 60
Average daily fare: S$120
Average weekly fare: S$120 * 5 = S$600
Sign-up bonus: S$100
New driver incentive: S$100
Total Average Weekly Costs – S$220
Average daily petrol costs: S$40
Average weekly petrol costs: S$40 * 5 = S$200
Average daily carparking costs: S$4
Average weekly carparking costs: S$4 * 5 = S$20
Net Weekly Earnings for Month 1 – S$580
Month 2 as experienced driver without bonus and incentive
Net Weekly Earnings for Month 2 – S$380
Wow, the bonus and incentive does make a big difference. And it looks like a normal 5 day work week and hours with Uber is going to be tough going if you plan to rely on driving Uber as a long-term full-time job with minimal savings and investments. You need the 6th day of driving to hit the higher incentive target and generate cash for savings and investments.
However, if you have already been working full-time and built up significant savings and investments, it is possible to drive Uber as a replacement job with the same work days and hours for quite a while after getting retrenched. Especially if your partner is still working.
In my case, my wife’s salary income is already sufficient to meet all the expenses for the month with no reduction. I could be saving all my earnings from Uber and still have enough to invest. Nice, I shall pitch this as a contingency plan to my wife since the maths work out.
This wouldn’t work if it’s the other way around. My salary income is only sufficient if we cut some expenses. Plus my wife has no interest in driving Uber. Time to find another contingency plan for her!
Uhhh …. won’t it be easier to give tuition?? True, the starting may be less than driving Uber/Grab while building up reputation, contacts, and portfolio of students. Especially if in the initial phase you need to tie yourself to some tuition centre. But in the medium to long term should be better returns.
Giving tuition has been a gig job for SG & northeast-Asian countries since maybe oh …. 1975. Except North Korea (or maybe not). Previously known as underground/hidden/black job market — coz you can escape paying income taxes. 🙂
If in angmoh country then die, have to drive Uber coz nobody there will be interested in paying big bucks for tuition! 🙂
Hmmm, I haven’t considered the route of giving tuition. As you said, it’s probably more difficult to get it up and running but more sustainable in the long run. My sister initially gave tuition once or twice a week for some students in a tuition centre. She has since gone on to having her own students since she has better control of the venue and time. I might ask her how she did it since giving tuition might be more suitable as an alternative!
i dont think you can just borrow the 2nd hand car from somebody for ubering. the car has to be fully paid for, converted to a commercial vehicle via your own newly setup limo company, pay commercial driving insurance, etc. not so easy but not impossible if you are not going the rental route.
Haha, okay, so I guess borrowing my parents-in-law’s car might not work. Or I have to incur additional costs to make the necessary arrangements. Again, making it more difficult to drive Uber as a leisure part-time job!
In the second month, there are still some incentives so your earnings would probably be a little higher. However it is also structured a little differently, split into weekdays and weekend. I felt it was less lucrative so I decided to stop driving after the first month. For example:
Monday – Friday
45 trips – $75
75 Trips – $165
Friday -Monday (4am)
25 trips – $75
45 Trips – $175
From what i heard, Uber tracks your driving patterns and then comes up with tailored incentive schemes designed to entice you to drive more than usual.
Good to hear from you Kelvin! Yeah, it does look like you have to put in quite a bit of driving time for Uber to be lucrative, especially when you have to rent the car. If you have your own car, it might be possible to drive Uber less intensively but the earnings will not be high.
Uh, I think you didn’t account for maintenance? Driving so frequently will drive up mileage. That means having to go workshop more frequently.
Oh yeah, that makes sense. There would be additional costs from having to send the car in for servicing more often. Maybe $100 per month for maintenance costs!