It really is that expensive. Car owners routinely underestimate the amount of money their cars cost to own and operate. They are very unreliable narrators when reporting how much their cars cost them. So many costs are hidden, that it feels cheap.
Once you account for
* the opportunity cost of the up-front money you paid for your car (or the cost of the loan to buy it) compared to investing that money or simply putting it in a high-interest savings account
* the cost of car insurance
* the cost of car maintenance
* the cost of depreciation
* the cost of fuel
it adds up very very quickly to gigantic quantities of money.
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> 30-40€ one way taxi rides get expensive pretty quickly and 40-60€ day rents for car is not that many uses...
Nobody is advocating you rely on taxi rides to get around. 40-60€ day rentals, or 1€/km metered rentals absolute can save you money relative to car ownership so long as you don't use them super often.
