Thanks to @beanz for editing! Music by @votu

A couple of months ago when the Steem price was rising, there were plenty of upbeat posts about what people had bought with their Steem earnings. For example some had been able to purchase laptops, farm animals/equipment, headphones and others had simply been lifted out of poverty. What was really cool about those was that they never put any money into Steem, it was pure earnings from posting as authors.

However, if you did invest in Steem, especially at the right time, you may have made far more than even the top trending authors. I started investing in Steem in July of last year, quite soon after I first joined and started making posting rewards. I spent a fair bit of time thinking about Steem as a platform and as an investment, to understand what I was buying into. I invested a little at first after the price had already fallen from its first peak (over $4.30), only for it to fall more during August (below $1). As the price dropped, I bought more. I was continuously in the red, with more apparent losses month after month. Despite losses, I kept doubling down, in fact some of the most money I spent was at a price $0.07, after months of stagnation and widespread belief that the platform was doomed. While acknowledging problems, I continued to believe in the core concept and a contrarian investment philosophy helped me make that decision.

We all know how that turned out, from a low of less than 6 cents, Steem tripled in value in March shortly after @dan announced his resignation. At the same time there was an experiment in the distribution of influence, as well as rapid growth in certain developing world regions. Whatever the reason, the price of Steem was eventually propelled back to $2.80, and I had far more of them now. You can view my Steemwhales page for a mostly accurate but incomplete picture. Prior to hard fork 16 I would invest entirely in Steem Power due to the inflationary model of Steem, but afterwards I started investing in liquid Steem as well as a shorter term bet, and I sold that from $1 all the way up to $2.80. I have still kept the vast majority of my Steem powered up.

So that's how I was able to spend €30,000 on a brand new Nissan Leaf. I'm also happy to show the world how I got it. The Steem logo is on the sides and front, we've already had a number of people ask us about it. The decals cost €200 to put on. It's expected that it will take about 4-5 years before there is noticeable wear and tear, which is a lot of time to make impressions while it's driven in Dublin by myself and my sister @beanz. From that perspective it is a low cost way of having the Steem logo seen by a lot of people. It’s also a strong impression, putting a logo on your car is a big deal, it means it’s something you probably really care about.



@beanz is pretty happy with it (^_^)

A Steem-mobile

If you're interested in the car itself, it's pretty cool. It's 100% electric, and while it's no Tesla, it's surprisingly impressive for what it is. I got the 30kWhr battery version, with an EPA range of 107 miles. That's a realistic estimate, but I live in a small country with plenty of fast charging facilities. So within Ireland there is no practical limit on the range, although if I want to go to Cork or Donegal I will need to take a short coffee break while it charges up again. Incidentally those charging points are free, we’ve paid nothing for electricity so far since we have only used public charging points. We’ve just now had a charging point installed in our home, and with a night meter the fuel costs of the car will be less than 1/5th of an equivalent petrol car. Maintenance costs are also greatly reduced vs. petrol cars, with much fewer moving parts that can fail or deteriorate. It's quite fast too, as an electric car you get instant torque when you press the pedal. You can definitely feel that when you’re in the car. I’ve heard different measurements of how fast it goes 0-60 (some say 5 seconds, others say 10, it seems to be somewhere in the middle of those), but it is much faster than conventional cars at going from 0-30, which is something that matters more when you mostly drive in the city and your local area.

The electric vehicle grant brought the price of the car down €5000, it would have been €35,000 otherwise. You could get a 1 or 2 series BMW for that price, but the fuel and maintenance costs would be vastly more. Savings on fuel and maintenance should amount to over €2000 each year, meaning that after 5 years the savings bring it equal in cost to an equivalent petrol car costing €10,000 less. Assuming normal use, the batteries deteriorate to 80% capacity after about 10 years, although if I misuse my batteries they would deteriorate faster, and taking good care of them can make them last much longer. When the batteries reach that point they will likely be refurbished or entirely replaced. If I'm somehow unlucky enough to experience batteries deteriorating quickly, they are covered by warranty and Nissan will replace them.