Anyone getting good car rental prices?

[coastgirl]

I've just started looking for March and the best I've done is about $350 for 10 days through Costco.ca. Hoping for better...

 

[5mouseketeersforus]

I'm not sure about March rates but we were just checking rates for early January and they seemed high - suppose it's because it is lsst minute?

If you have airmiles, you can redeem points for a car rental. We just booked through airmiles with Budget for an intermediate car. 1200 air miles + $57 = week car rental

Lots of discount codes on mousesavers as well so try there

Have a fabulous trip!

HTH

 

[Sue M]

I've just started looking for March and the best I've done is about $350 for 10 days through Costco.ca. Hoping for better...

That's not bad rate? Check both Costco sites, CA & USA. Sometimes one will be cheaper then the other. I check prices frequently because they seem to go up & down a lot it's almost a full time job.
Currently I have $133 for 1/17 evening pick up, & 1/21 mid day drop off at TTC after we check into resort. We fly first into Ft Lauderdale alamo

In August I have $313 for 10 days with Budget. They have a desk at the DTD Doubletree.

Keep checking regularly.

We have our car rental insurance thru our Autoplan. Annual policy. Soo cheap.

 

[migel]

Check sites like Expedia.ca, Hotwire.com, and Travelocity.ca often, as rates will fluctuate. Priceline.com lets you bid on a price, but I've not gotten any reasonable rate from them (their last recommendation was that I raise my bid to $115 per day - for a small car- ha!) My wife and daughter are flying out tomorrow for a brief 4 day visit. I made the mistake of buying them plane tickets as a Christmas gift, before I scoped up car rental prices considering the time of year. They are flying into Sanford airport, and because it's a Sunday, and they arrive late, the rental fees are absolutely ridiculous. Most sites, including the aforementioned, want between $600 and $750 for a 5 day rental (small to mid size car). I originally booked with Costco at $415 (still high, I rented a car for 5 days in October through Costco out of MCO for $115 total), but after getting some input via this forum, I booked with Budget, using a coupon code, for $268. Still high, but half of what they are asking.
Once you find your lowest rate over the next couple of weeks, I would book it (as long as there is no cancellation fee - i.e, Expedia) then keep looking. We will be driving down in March, but I imagine the rental fees will climb slowly. Good luck!

 

[Sue M]

Check sites like Expedia.ca, Hotwire.com, and Travelocity.ca often, as rates will fluctuate. Priceline.com lets you bid on a price, but I've not gotten any reasonable rate from them (their last recommendation was that I raise my bid to $115 per day - for a small car- ha!) My wife and daughter are flying out tomorrow for a brief 4 day visit. I made the mistake of buying them plane tickets as a Christmas gift, before I scoped up car rental prices considering the time of year. They are flying into Sanford airport, and because it's a Sunday, and they arrive late, the rental fees are absolutely ridiculous. Most sites, including the aforementioned, want between $600 and $750 for a 5 day rental (small to mid size car). I originally booked with Costco at $415 (still high, I rented a car for 5 days in October through Costco out of MCO for $115 total), but after getting some input via this forum, I booked with Budget, using a coupon code, for $268. Still high, but half of what they are asking.
Once you find your lowest rate over the next couple of weeks, I would book it (as long as there is no cancellation fee - i.e, Expedia) then keep looking. We will be driving down in March, but I imagine the rental fees will climb slowly. Good luck!

Did you check a car service that picks them up from airport & returns them? Sounds like it may be cheaper then car rental. Not sure of Sanford prices, we always use MCO. There's lots of car services you can pre book for a flat rate. Maybe get some recommendations from transportation thread.

 

[Gina-Gina-Bo-Bina]

We have a full size reserved with Dollar for our May trip, 8 days, $165 taxes included. Its the best we have been able to secure so far.

 

[ccudmore]

I was able to get $166 for 7 days in March through Costco. Probably depends a lot on the class of vehicle you're looking for.

 

[vacation_junkie]

I've just started looking for March and the best I've done is about $350 for 10 days through Costco.ca. Hoping for better...

Check rental car momma and mousesavers websites. We always find awesome discount codes on there.

 

[dennise]

We have a minivan April 8-19 for $166 taxes in, but we are picking up in St. Petes and dropping off in Orlando.

 

[TLPL]

Have you check out the mouse savers website? They have a section listing all the available codes for rental car in Orlando / LA area.

 

[amie416]

I always book the first price I come across that I'm willing to pay for and then keep checking to see if I can do better. I'm pretty lucky with randomly checking car rental prices whenever I'm online and catching some pretty good price drops. I managed to book a fullsized car from Alamo at Tampa (last week in February) for $106.78 (178.97 after all taxes and fees). This was back in October... since then the price has skyrocketed to almost 6 times that price.

 

[coastgirl]

Thanks folks; I need to get serious and track down the options. Like Amie, I have booked something I can live with, now I have to do the legwork. Did a half-hour or so from Mousesavers list and didn't get anything better (or good-as) the costco price but I'll keep trying...got a couple months, and I know 6 weeks or so is often the sweet spot.

 

[mike28j]

3/14 (MC0) - 3/22 (TPA) Intermediate with Alamo through Costco.com - $169.68, oddly enough it was as expensive if I returned the car on the 21st...

 

[Craigdarroch]

We got a steal at Dollar (Orlando International) on a midsize for 13 days at $109. We booked back in October for our April trip this year and just got lucky. Our friends are going the same time and tried to book with Dollar and can't seem to get anything less than $300 for the same amount of time... so I'm checking rates for them as well.

 

[s u]

3/14 (MC0) - 3/22 (TPA) Intermediate with Alamo through Costco.com - $169.68, oddly enough it was as expensive if I returned the car on the 21st...

I'm traveling the same dates. However, I get rentals over $400 on Costco.com

When did you book?

 

[mike28j]

Intermediate cars have been at that price for a while, I check daily. I remember last year saving about $70 on my rental within the 2 week before my trip. It seemed like every day the price was dropping $5 - $10

 

[lilia78]

I booked through Car Rental Savers, compact car $183.79 USD for January 26- Feb 2.

 

[dancin Disney style]

When using Costco to book, Canadians MUST use Costco.ca. We are not able to book via the American site. It's very clearly stated in the fine print.

Even for March break I have never paid more than $100 all in for a 1 week rental. Prices always go up before they go down.

 

[madcore]

When using Costco to book, Canadians MUST use Costco.ca. We are not able to book via the American site. It's very clearly stated in the fine print.

Even for March break I have never paid more than $100 all in for a 1 week rental. Prices always go up before they go down.

If I remember correctly, last year we were around $120 for one week rental.

 

[AprilFool]

When using Costco to book, Canadians MUST use Costco.ca. We are not able to book via the American site. It's very clearly stated in the fine print.

Even for March break I have never paid more than $100 all in for a 1 week rental. Prices always go up before they go down.

We priced out rentals in both Costco.ca and Costco.com. The U.S. was a better deal. The fine print states U.S. resident but we were still able to book it for our trip this weekend. I called the U.S. costco travel number and they verified that yes we could rent off the us website.