How Much Should I Spend on Transport?

The full cost of car ownership: If you own a car, your transport total includes far more than fuel. Add the monthly loan installment (if any), annual insurance amortised monthly, registration fees, routine maintenance (oil changes, tyres), and a reserve for unplanned repairs. In Egypt and Gulf countries, unplanned repairs are significant but unpredictable — most car owners underestimate transport by ignoring this category entirely.

Ride-hailing — convenient but expensive at scale: Apps like Uber, Careem, and InDrive make point-to-point travel easy, but daily commuting via ride-hailing is one of the fastest ways to exceed any transport budget. A typical round-trip ride in Cairo of 40–50 EGP, done 22 working days per month, equals 880–1,100 EGP — often comparable to or higher than a monthly car loan installment. Compare your ride-hailing total to public transit alternatives at least once a year.

Public transit as a budget reset: In Cairo, the metro and bus network covers major routes at a fraction of ride-hailing costs. A consistent use of public transit for the main commute — supplemented by ride-hailing only for outlier trips — can reduce transport spending by 40–60% compared to daily app usage. The trade-off is time and comfort. This is a financial decision worth making deliberately, not by default.

The cost-per-year view — small rides are large habits: Use the cost-per-year calculator with your daily transport spend to see the true annual total. A 50 EGP daily Careem habit costs 18,250 EGP a year. A 20 EGP daily micro-bus habit costs 7,300 EGP. The annual perspective transforms small daily decisions into meaningful financial ones.

Setting a transport budget that holds: Transport spending is lumpy — a large service bill hits in one month, then nothing for three months. A strict monthly cap rarely works. Instead, set an average monthly target and track the running total over a quarter. If January is high due to a service, February and March average it down. Quarterly tracking is far more useful than monthly panic.

Tracking transport in Masareefi: Log fuel, maintenance, and transit separately in Masareefi. Over two or three months you will have an accurate average — and you will see clearly which sub-category is driving the total. Most people find that either the car loan or ride-hailing alone accounts for most of their transport budget, and everything else is marginal.