Comments on: Researching Rental Cars

By: The Last Carnival of Personal Finance of the Year! | Finance Blog

The Last Carnival of Personal Finance of the Year! | Finance Blog — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 05:59:07 +0000

[...] Broke from Fabulously Broke in the City presents Researching Rental Cars, and says, “Comparing rental cars against each other based on a set of [...]

By: Ellen

Ellen — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 20:16:42 +0000

I do the same thing (& have found the same results), although I usually start with one or more of the big travel websites, check their rates, then go to the individual car rental websites (and airlines & hotels, for that matter). I also have found that the "coupons" and other plans that supposedly offer discounts (credit cards or organizations I belong to) are almost never the best deal.

@michelle – good idea to keep shopping on car rentals – & hotels. None of the car rental places actually charge you before you pick up the car.

Two other points of interest: If you can rent the car from a company's pick-up site that is not associated with the airport (i.e., at a hotel or somewhere across town), the rates can be a lot cheaper. Also, recently my DH needed to rent a car while out of town & had asked me to make the arrangements from home. However, he found time to check locally himself & the rate was 1/4 of the best rate I'd found (yes, 1/4th) – so it might pay to wait until you get to the destination unless you need some specific type of exotic wheels.

By: FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com

FB @ FabulouslyBroke.com — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 19:57:18 +0000

Great tip on rechecking the price before the lock-in date..

By: michelle

michelle — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 17:36:05 +0000

I've used Dollar a couple times in the past. Not sure if it's the same with other companies, but when you make a reservation, you don't pay anything at the time. You pay when you get there. So I had a pretty good deal reserved, but checked again a few days before the trip. And what do you know? The price had dropped by more than half! Make one new reservation and cancel the old without penalty. It pays to keep shopping in this case.

By: Michelle

Michelle — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 03:59:34 +0000

I always go with Enterprise. I’m a preferred customer (you’re automatically enrolled at no charge if you rent from them all the time) and have had no problems with them. If you request a specific car and they have it, it’s yours and for a discounted rate if you become a preferred customer.

I never chose their insurance because it’s expensive and our provincial auto insurer offers car rental insurance at $2/day and it covers everything you have covered on your own automobile insurance.
.-= Michelle´s last blog ..You’ve got a fast car, I want a ticket to anywhere =-.

By: munchkin

munchkin — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 03:36:18 +0000

dont go with budget! I rented a car with them once, it broke down, i had to call the 24 hr support thing and they brought me a new car. When i took it back they tried to charge me 100 bucks extra for the gas!! LOL if anything i should of got a dicount seeing as they gave me a car that broke down. I doubt they inspect them after each rental.

By: SS4BC

SS4BC — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 17:59:34 +0000

Every time I rent a car I do exactly this. I search each car company for the dates I'm gone, put the final price in a spread sheet and also use the discount codes (like from Costco or from my work – we have a deal with National that includes insurance). In my spread sheet I have the name of the company, the discount code I used, and the final price. That way when I'm finished going through I can quickly see which was the least expensive. To date, I have ONLY used Budget and Alamo – between the two of them they have ALWAYS given me the cheapest rate.