How Much Time is Saved by Telecommuting?

I estimate that I retain an extra 70 minutes of my life per day by not commuting to a conventional business office. This assumes that I would be working about 25 minutes away, which I feel would be a likely commute given the suitable companies in that driving radius from my home. I’m unable to move residences to minimize commute time further due to the necessity to stay where we are due to the need to retain a reasonable driving distance for my wife (who commutes 35 minutes each way).

Here’s the breakdown of how I save 70 minutes a day telecommuting:

50 minutes driving time, round-trip
10 minutes dressing for business
10 minutes parking, getting into the building, getting nabbed for watercooler talk, etc.

I would bet that for others, 70 minutes could be a conservative estimate of time savings. I know numerous friends and family members that have much more of a commute than 25 minutes one-way, including my wife. There are probably other categories of time savings that I’m not including such as increased car refueling stops and frequency of automobile service visits, etc., but I’ve kept my list to the items that occur on a daily basis.

When you take out 9 hours of sleep (which I personally require), 9 hours of work daily (which I will use as a typical average workday across all disciplines), you will have 6 hours left to “live your life”. Based on those numbers, it’s not a stretch to to estimate that telecommuters can have 24% more “life” time than the average commuter during the work week.