Rental Car Availability

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davemanjam
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Rental Car Availability

Post by davemanjam »

Traveling to Jackson Hole, WY at the end of May.
I was aware of rental car availability issues and can confirm just about all the majors showed zero availability or massively increased prices.
I was able to book and pre-pay with Avis, to what amounted to about ~$100/day for a midsize. (More expensive than normal, but not unreasonable)
But i'm extremely worried now that I'm going to show up and find they have nothing there for me. And of course the trip centers around traveling by car through yellowstone, etc.
I tried calling their customer service but the call center had no idea why I was concerned and gave no better indication.
Anyone have experience here lately? Or any contingency advice?
badger42
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by badger42 »

Contingency advice: Don't count on Uber/Lyft. LOTS of drivers are either temporarily (COVID, stimulus checks, etc) or permanently (got a full time job) off the platform.
davebo
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by davebo »

Since you have a reservation, I think you're fine, but don't blame you for being worried. I'm assuming there are always some extra cars available.

When we were at Disney earlier this month, I did notice that Uber prices really were fluctuating when surge pricing went into effect. I'm assuming that's all based on supply/demand, so would assume that drivers would be all over that if they saw those types of prices.
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RickBoglehead
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by RickBoglehead »

davebo wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 3:57 pm Since you have a reservation, I think you're fine, but don't blame you for being worried. I'm assuming there are always some extra cars available.

When we were at Disney earlier this month, I did notice that Uber prices really were fluctuating when surge pricing went into effect. I'm assuming that's all based on supply/demand, so would assume that drivers would be all over that if they saw those types of prices.
You must not be watching the news. Your assumption that there are always some extra cars is not correct, now. People with reservations show up, no vehicles. They wait, someone returns a vehicle, it's cleaned and fueled, and the first person in line gets it. Belonging to a status group, like Hertz President's Circle, would give you a higher priority.

OP has prepaid. He'll find out if that's worth something or not. They can't give you what they don't have.

For the OP, anyone's experience other than at your rental location would not be relevant, and even at that location irrelevant a month prior. Good luck!
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SrGrumpy
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by SrGrumpy »

davemanjam wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 3:16 pm But i'm extremely worried now that I'm going to show up and find they have nothing there for me. And of course the trip centers around traveling by car through yellowstone, etc.
I hear ya! I'm getting paranoid too, though the pickup for my road trip is next Tuesday in Milwaukee - which I'm hoping beats the summer rush. Yellowstone without a car would be quite a challenge for you. Good luck.

P.S. You got a relatively amazing deal, fwiw. The cheapest Avis daily rate at Jackson Hole airport shows as $238 prepaid for a random week beginning late-May that I just plugged in.
Last edited by SrGrumpy on Thu Apr 29, 2021 6:24 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Trader Joe
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by Trader Joe »

davemanjam wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 3:16 pm Traveling to Jackson Hole, WY at the end of May.
I was aware of rental car availability issues and can confirm just about all the majors showed zero availability or massively increased prices.
I was able to book and pre-pay with Avis, to what amounted to about ~$100/day for a midsize. (More expensive than normal, but not unreasonable)
But i'm extremely worried now that I'm going to show up and find they have nothing there for me. And of course the trip centers around traveling by car through yellowstone, etc.
I tried calling their customer service but the call center had no idea why I was concerned and gave no better indication.
Anyone have experience here lately? Or any contingency advice?
If you are worried you can always use Uber.
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willthrill81
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by willthrill81 »

This was a bit on Seinfeld. Dead serious.

Sadly, a reservation is not a guarantee. But in the current environment, I don't know that there's much you can do about it. Perhaps you could make a reservation with another company starting the next day, and if your first reservation works out, you could cancel the second. If not, try to use Uber or Lyft to get around for the first day. This requires that you be able to cancel the second reservation within ~24 hours without penalty.

There are websites out there where private entities rent their cars out to people, like AirBnB for cars. I have no experience with that, but I've heard Clark Howard talk about it.
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knibloe
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by knibloe »

Read an article earlier this week that there are no rental cars available in Hawaii. People have literally been renting Uhaul box trucks to drive around the islands.
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Nate79
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by Nate79 »

Clark Howard recently discussed this topic - it's a real problem. Ideas mentioned included having a backup reservation as well as take an Uber to hotel (to wait for a car to become available) or off site rental car agency.
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celia
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by celia »

If you are flying and picking up a car at the airport, I think arriving mid-day is optimal. Most of the cars for those leaving have already been returned and you would be earlier than many incoming travelers.

I live on the west coast and when we fly east, we are always landing at night. (Even if I take off at 9am, most of my destinations are already at noon.). I always have a car reservation but the last time I landed there were only 5 cars left in my car category and they were all the same make and model, so when there is a feature I don’t like, they all have it.

You can also put in a second reservation with another company and cancel it when you get your car.
four7s
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by four7s »

In January I reserved through Avis a Premium SUV for a cross country trip in July. This trip has been in the making for many months and I started to read and hear of the horror stories happening with rental car unavailability at the airports. I was worried. So two weeks ago I went on line to see what might happen to my reservation by changing the pick up date by ONE day. The computer said that the car I reserved was no longer available. :oops: Frow what I understand the rental companies apparently sold off much of their inventory due to covid and since the business traveler is still sidelined they don't have the rental volume to warrant jumping back in and they are in a bind. And so are the customers with pre-paid reservations. Good Luck.
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RickBoglehead
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by RickBoglehead »

four7s wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 5:53 pm In January I reserved through Avis a Premium SUV for a cross country trip in July. This trip has been in the making for many months and I started to read and hear of the horror stories happening with rental car unavailability at the airports. I was worried. So two weeks ago I went on line to see what might happen to my reservation by changing the pick up date by ONE day. The computer said that the car I reserved was no longer available. :oops: Frow what I understand the rental companies apparently sold off much of their inventory due to covid and since the business traveler is still sidelined they don't have the rental volume to warrant jumping back in and they are in a bind. And so are the customers with pre-paid reservations. Good Luck.
They can't jump back in when auto production is constrained by chip and plastic shortages... Fleet sales aren't anywhere near as profitable as consumer sales, so production isn't going to be held for rental car companies either.

Hertz is also in bankruptcy.
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THY4373
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by THY4373 »

Some car dealerships (I suspect more now) also rent cars so that may be an option to consider. Personally I am only booking travel where I can avoid the rental car apocalypse.
adamthesmythe
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by adamthesmythe »

Trader Joe wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 4:39 pm
davemanjam wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 3:16 pm Traveling to Jackson Hole, WY at the end of May.
I was aware of rental car availability issues and can confirm just about all the majors showed zero availability or massively increased prices.
I was able to book and pre-pay with Avis, to what amounted to about ~$100/day for a midsize. (More expensive than normal, but not unreasonable)
But i'm extremely worried now that I'm going to show up and find they have nothing there for me. And of course the trip centers around traveling by car through yellowstone, etc.
I tried calling their customer service but the call center had no idea why I was concerned and gave no better indication.
Anyone have experience here lately? Or any contingency advice?
If you are worried you can always use Uber.
I guess OP could take an Uber 80 miles to the park entrance, then have the driver drive him around the park for a day or two, and then 80 miles back to the airport.

I wonder how much that would cost?
iamlucky13
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by iamlucky13 »

davebo wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 3:57 pm Since you have a reservation, I think you're fine, but don't blame you for being worried. I'm assuming there are always some extra cars available.

When we were at Disney earlier this month, I did notice that Uber prices really were fluctuating when surge pricing went into effect. I'm assuming that's all based on supply/demand, so would assume that drivers would be all over that if they saw those types of prices.
Reservations mean close to nothing in the rental car world. There's been past threads about this, pre-Covid. This is the downside to the policies that make it extremely easy to cancel a rental reservation.

Prepaying hopefully means something, but I think most of us have the experience of prepaying for a flight, and showing up at the airport to find they don't have a seat for us. I've also prepaid for airport parking, and showed up to find out they overbooked their parking spots, which is perhaps worse, because unlike with airlines, the parking companies have almost no accountability (and can cause you to miss your flight without any responsibility falling on the airline).

I can't say for certain whether the same applies to prepaid car rentals, so my advice if you want to take this trip is have a fall back plan. The best I can think of offhand is include an extra day in the schedule so you snag a return later in the day or the next morning.

I do know some of the premium status tiers can help a surprising amount, because airlines, hotels, and rental car companies bend over backwards to keep the highest volume customers happy. My sister travels an extreme amount for work and has all the fancy-sounding loyalty titles. She occasionally has stories about major issues coming up like being massively overbooked, and being told there was absolutely nothing they could do for her, just like they told everyone else in the line. She asks if it makes any difference that she has the diamond-encrusted, platinum-alloyed, ambrosia-flavored, strato-status, and the response is usually along the lines of, "Well why didn't you say so! Give us a few minutes to bring your car around," followed (I imagine) by them rushing over to a dealership with a suitcase full of cash, or if it's after hours, a ski mask and a crowbar. :twisted:
wolf359
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by wolf359 »

The economic issue with the rental cars is that as a large capitol expense, the cars cost money whether they're being rented or not. During the COVID lockdowns, rental companies that were slower to react had their costs eat them alive and they had large losses. At least one of the majors went into bankruptcy. The faster reacting ones sold off their fleets. Now that the economy is re-opening, they don't have enough cars. They can't buy them, either -- COVID is impacting different parts of the world at different rates. The supply chain is short on chips that new cars need, and so car manufacturing is back-logged.

What does this mean for you?

Perhaps you should try a car rental company that is not dependent on the traditional fleet model. Why not try one of the car-sharing companies, that is the Uber equivalent of the car renting world? Privately owned vehicles probably didn't face the same issue. Also, people who may not be willing to be Uber drivers might be willing to let their cars be rented out without them in it.

A quick google search turned up "Turo." There may be competitors. Maybe they have cars available to rent?

Disclaimer: I'm just thinking outside the box here. I'm not in the market for a car rental, and I've never used Turo. I've never even heard of them until I just googled it. It's just a different approach, like the people renting U-Hauls in Hawaii.
SrGrumpy
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by SrGrumpy »

adamthesmythe wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 6:30 pm
I guess OP could take an Uber 80 miles to the park entrance, then have the driver drive him around the park for a day or two, and then 80 miles back to the airport.

I wonder how much that would cost?
Currently $240 to Old Faithful, one way. I strongly doubt the Uber driver will take someone anywhere that hasn't been requested through the app.
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by 123 »

Perhaps you could change your trip to a backpacking excursion and start the hike right from the airport.
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IMO
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by IMO »

I'm curious if rental car costs are going to slow down/hinder the travel industry this summer.

Been looking at some common flights coming up for this summer that I take for short trips and the rental car costs are running about $100/day for any vehicle. Typically I could get a similar rental for about $20 to $30/day. I know it's made me change/forgo some of the planned trips because of high rental costs. Now if real availability starts to be a problem with reservations, then can't imagine people won't start to rethink some travel plans that need a rental car if their weeklong trip starts costing $500 more and with questionable real availability when they get to the rental counter. Maybe it won't because people want to finally get out and will just pay the increases and take the risk.

Personally, I'm seeing real inflation in many things right now.
Afty
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by Afty »

Man, we are going to Yellowstone in July and the only rental car I could find was $1500 for 8 days! And who knows if it will even be there when we arrive.
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by Wannaretireearly »

Had to wait over an hour in Phoenix for my budget/costco car.

I'd recommend getting loyalty plan, wish I didn't have to wait in line!
Also check out turo.com could be a good backup option
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ponyboy
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by ponyboy »

All of these travel related companies took a massive hit for 1.5 years. They're going to make it up somehow...which means they're just going to pass it on to the consumers. I randomly searched around for places ive been to in the past, 6 months from now and rentals were around $70-$100/day. Usually, they were around $25-$35/day. Glad im not traveling this year. Ill stay within 500 miles from my house, we can drive ourselves.
aude
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by aude »

Hmm. Carmax allows you to return your car within 30 days / 1,500 miles if you don’t like it.
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by aude »

Another option could be flying into a larger city with more rental cars such as Denver or Salt Lake City
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Watty
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by Watty »

davemanjam wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 3:16 pm Or any contingency advice?
You also need to be prepared to run into things like shortages of hotel and restaurant workers.

There are not a lot of people that live in the area so it is common for them to bring in seasonal workers from other parts of the country, or even overseas on special seasonal work visas. They need to arrange for them long in advance and I would suspect they have not been able to do that this year.

I was raised in the midwest and I heard of several college students and people in their 20s who worked a summer at some place like Yellowstone. It actually sounded like a good experience but it did not pay much.

Housing for seasonal workers is often in some sort of dorm or barracks style housing which few people would want to be in during a pandemic if that was even allowed.

I was in that area three years ago and even then I ran into at least one restaurant that was only open limited days and hours because they could not get seasonal workers from overseas, often Eastern Europe, because seasonal work visas were being restricted. They had done that for many years. They were very unhappy about that and they had a sign at the restaurant entrance was was a bit of a rant explaining how the lack of work visas was hurting them.

I would expect that things like Uber are practically nonexistent there but I could be mistaken. If you are staying at a large hotel or resort you might call them to see what they would suggest since they may have tour busses or a shuttle to get you from the airport.
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davemanjam
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by davemanjam »

Thanks for the replies thus far.
I will become a priority member with Avis.
I will call the actual rental location in the weeks/days priory to travel to see what I can find out.

I don't mind paying more, but I've made a decision on the trip given the current pricing.
Obviously if it was double that or zero availability, then I would have chosen not to move forward with the trip.

Understand there is a shortage of hotels, restaurants, workers, but Hotels at least didn't get sold for some other purpose.
Going to pre-book all of that.

I have looked into TURO, very limited options, question if I trust that.
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sperry8
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by sperry8 »

davemanjam wrote: Fri Apr 30, 2021 9:14 am Thanks for the replies thus far.
I will become a priority member with Avis.
I will call the actual rental location in the weeks/days priory to travel to see what I can find out.

I don't mind paying more, but I've made a decision on the trip given the current pricing.
Obviously if it was double that or zero availability, then I would have chosen not to move forward with the trip.

Understand there is a shortage of hotels, restaurants, workers, but Hotels at least didn't get sold for some other purpose.
Going to pre-book all of that.

I have looked into TURO, very limited options, question if I trust that.
Calling them in advance will get you nowhere. They want to rent you the car you reserved. But car rental companies deal with no-shows and as such, overbook. They either have the car when you show up or they don't. Calling them weeks in advance is a waste of time. If you want to know their inventory, call the location the night before. That's when they shuttle cars around for the next days reservations.
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IMO
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by IMO »

Watty wrote: Fri Apr 30, 2021 8:09 am
davemanjam wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 3:16 pm Or any contingency advice?
You also need to be prepared to run into things like shortages of hotel and restaurant workers.

There are not a lot of people that live in the area so it is common for them to bring in seasonal workers from other parts of the country, or even overseas on special seasonal work visas. They need to arrange for them long in advance and I would suspect they have not been able to do that this year.

I was raised in the midwest and I heard of several college students and people in their 20s who worked a summer at some place like Yellowstone. It actually sounded like a good experience but it did not pay much.

Housing for seasonal workers is often in some sort of dorm or barracks style housing which few people would want to be in during a pandemic if that was even allowed.

I was in that area three years ago and even then I ran into at least one restaurant that was only open limited days and hours because they could not get seasonal workers from overseas, often Eastern Europe, because seasonal work visas were being restricted. They had done that for many years. They were very unhappy about that and they had a sign at the restaurant entrance was was a bit of a rant explaining how the lack of work visas was hurting them.

I would expect that things like Uber are practically nonexistent there but I could be mistaken. If you are staying at a large hotel or resort you might call them to see what they would suggest since they may have tour busses or a shuttle to get you from the airport.
I do think the seasonal worker thing may be an issue.

Even worse, I heard on NPR the other day that there is even the question about will many US based workers even return to work because the unemployment benefits may in fact make it better to forgo working and just continue to collect unemployment benefits until Sept 2021 when the current unemployment bonus expires. I suspect that deadline will continue to get pushed back farther and farther. On my android phone, the other day what was trending was that a state was going to reinstate the having to look for work requirement to continue unemployment benefits. Many of the sites it linked to on the trend were sites talking about how to get around that look for work requirement. I don't know what the threshold for trending topics, but I'm sure it's alot of people looking at the topic.

I see many help wanted signs at stores, etc where I live, and I know even the summer job my high schooler is doing (which is a typical hs kid job) was having trouble getting enough people to sign up.

Well have to see how the summer travel thing goes this year.
howard71
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by howard71 »

Just picked up a Budget rental car at Denver Airport last Sunday. Price was still high but there were LOTS of cars on the lot Sunday morning.

Also, if you are going to use Budget I recommend their Fast Break service which you sign up for through Amazon. Got dropped off at a separate stop before normal renters and the car was ready and waiting without even any papers to sign.
vinhodoporto
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by vinhodoporto »

It’s a real problem...

A C-level executive I know recently had to change their travel plans to fly to Orlando and drive to Tampa (actually they have one of the people in their entourage drive them) rather than fly to Tampa because no rental cars available in Tampa. They were going to several locations in FL over two days so an Uber wouldn’t work.
notBobToo
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by notBobToo »

Just got back from Denver. Rented from Enterprise, a first for me as I am a long time Hertz Gold (Five Star) member. For this (pleasure, not business) trip, however, the (reservation) rate from Hertz was over $700 for a 5 day rental, for nothing special. So I tried Enterprise. My reservation (for which I could not prepay) was for a "VW Jetta like" sedan for about $325. I ended up with a Hyundai Sonata after turning down a Ford Fusion and the offer of a small SUV.

Anyway, while not an abundance of available vehicles, seemed like enough to satisfy the couple of dozen of renters that piled out of the shuttle along with me.

Oh, and arrival time was around 11am, from the East coast.
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CardinalRule
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by CardinalRule »

I flew from SEA to PHX last week. A flight of 2 1/2 hours, and then 100 minutes standing in a long line for my Hertz reservation. :oops: There were not nearly enough cars, evidently, and so folks were being processed s-lo-w-l-y. There were only a handful of cars to choose from when I finally made it out of the line. This was on a Saturday.
tigerdoc93
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by tigerdoc93 »

My family and I just returned from an excellent vacation to Yellowstone national park. I can confirm that rental car availability is very low and very expensive. Fortunately, my wife discovered the Toyota dealership in Bozeman Montana rents vehicles. We were able to rent a Toyota Highlander hybrid for $499 for a week, unlimited miles. The only hitch was we had to pay $55 for a taxi to take us from the airport to the Toyota dealership. The taxi driver says they are getting 3000 - $5000 a week for rental cars. Crazy!
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snackdog
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by snackdog »

Agencies were full of cars in Maui last week. We had a Chevy Impala for $240/wk.
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vinhodoporto
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by vinhodoporto »

The rental car situation seems to be getting better recently in a lot of the places I travel for work.

For example I was in FL in March and April and could only get cars from lesser known agencies by making a reservation several weeks in advance and paying about 3x the normal price. Despite having the highest status with both Avis and Hertz they had nothing for me at any price.

When I went back a couple weeks ago prices were still higher than usual but about 1.5x normal rather than 3x. And there was plenty of availability from the big agencies. It’s possible some of this is seasonal but it seems like the rental car companies are ramping inventory back up. So you may not have to go to the same extremes as some people were a few months ago.
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by RoloRonnie »

davemanjam wrote: Thu Apr 29, 2021 3:16 pm Traveling to Jackson Hole, WY at the end of May.
I was aware of rental car availability issues and can confirm just about all the majors showed zero availability or massively increased prices.
I was able to book and pre-pay with Avis, to what amounted to about ~$100/day for a midsize. (More expensive than normal, but not unreasonable)
But i'm extremely worried now that I'm going to show up and find they have nothing there for me. And of course the trip centers around traveling by car through yellowstone, etc.
I tried calling their customer service but the call center had no idea why I was concerned and gave no better indication.
Anyone have experience here lately? Or any contingency advice?
Download the Turo app and see if you can find any “all-star” hosts with a high number of trips. You can communicate with then up front and can let the host know your situation.

I have used it 2-3 times in a pinch for rentals and it’s been great. Not sure how far you plan to drive - but most hosts charge per mile over 200 miles per day.
MDfan
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by MDfan »

We're using Turo for a trip in October. Saving about $300 for a SUV even after buying their insurance. I looked for someone with a lot of 5-star reviews. I've heard only good things about Turo so far.
Afty
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Re: Rental Car Availability

Post by Afty »

Afty wrote: Fri Apr 30, 2021 1:23 am Man, we are going to Yellowstone in July and the only rental car I could find was $1500 for 8 days! And who knows if it will even be there when we arrive.
This turned out better than expected. I checked rental car prices about a month before our trip, and to my great surprise, the cost had dropped by half! So I reserved the cheaper car, and had no issues when we arrived. This was pick up/drop off in Jackson Hole, WY.
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