Do any of you rent cars regularly for day routes?

I'd be interested in hearing from any of you who rent cars for one or more days for routes - whether it's just to keep the mileage off of your vehicle, or because your car is older/high mileage and you need to "save" it, if you understand my meaning?
It isn't unusual for my hubby to do 200-300 miles in a day for gas station routes, and his vehicle right now is pretty high mileage. (Nissan Xterra, 160k plus)
When he has a well-bonused route, I'm wondering if it wouldn't be better to rent a car for the day (paid for in 2 shops or less). Plus, it's certainly a deduction at the end of the year...

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I would not rent a car to do gas stations, but I have rented cars to do hotels that were more than 100 miles away. I have a luxury sedan, so I don't like to put excess miles on it.

I usually rent through Costco. I have found it to be the cheapest and easiest, even with coupons and discounts.

On occasion, Enterprise has a $9.99 a day weekend deal.

Totally worth it to rent, especially if you can get $30/day or less. I get weekly rentals for around that. There are a lot of tricks and after you become a frequent renter, you get nice upgrades.

I've done it before. I found it beneficial to rent at extremely cheap costs at airport locations and when I'm expected to put in hundreds of miles over the course of a couple days. It's a balance on what kind of work you're expecting, if your appearance matters, etc.

Shopping the Greater Denver Area, Colorado Springs and in-between in Colorado. 33 year old male and willing to travel!

I do not for routes. However, renting through your Costco membership is the very most economical way AND less than at the airport locations in almost every case.

Based in MD, near DC
Shopping from the Carolinas to New York
Have video cam; will travel

Poor customer service? Don't get mad; get video.

Whenever I’ve rented a car, it has come with a full tank of gas.
How would you be able to perform a gas station route without lugging gas cans about?

I have a Prius with almost 500k miles. If you need a reliable car, buy one of these. We have another newer one that has 137k over two and a half years.

@ColoKate63 wrote:

Whenever I’ve rented a car, it has come with a full tank of gas.
How would you be able to perform a gas station route without lugging gas cans about?

You can request a vehicle that has not been filled.

@ColoKate63 wrote:

Whenever I’ve rented a car, it has come with a full tank of gas.
How would you be able to perform a gas station route without lugging gas cans about?

I would get a small SUV, and take gas cans... that’s what we do now anyway. We usually do 10-15 stations minimum, so we take 3-4 5-gallon cans with us.

@Niner wrote:

I have a Prius with almost 500k miles. If you need a reliable car, buy one of these. We have another newer one that has 137k over two and a half years.

Hmmm...does Prius make an SUV? I’ll have to check into that

Prius is a Toyota sedan model. It is a full hybrid electric automobile developed and manufactured by Toyota since 1997. Initially offered as a 4-door sedan, it has been produced only as a 4-door liftback since 2003. It

@Mousegal wrote:

@Niner wrote:

I have a Prius with almost 500k miles. If you need a reliable car, buy one of these. We have another newer one that has 137k over two and a half years.

Hmmm...does Prius make an SUV? I’ll have to check into that

Shopping Southeast Pennsylvania, Delaware above the canal, and South Jersey since 2008

@myst4au wrote:

Prius is a Toyota sedan model. It is a full hybrid electric automobile developed and manufactured by Toyota since 1997. Initially offered as a 4-door sedan, it has been produced only as a 4-door liftback since 2003. It
@Mousegal wrote:

@Niner wrote:

I have a Prius with almost 500k miles. If you need a reliable car, buy one of these. We have another newer one that has 137k over two and a half years.

Hmmm...does Prius make an SUV? I’ll have to check into that

They made a larger wagon version.
[www.toyota.com]

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/18/2020 03:50AM by Niner.

Good to know. I never knew that, and I never saw one.

@Niner wrote:

@myst4au wrote:

Prius is a Toyota sedan model. It is a full hybrid electric automobile developed and manufactured by Toyota since 1997. Initially offered as a 4-door sedan, it has been produced only as a 4-door liftback since 2003. It
@Mousegal wrote:

@Niner wrote:

I have a Prius with almost 500k miles. If you need a reliable car, buy one of these. We have another newer one that has 137k over two and a half years.

Hmmm...does Prius make an SUV? I’ll have to check into that

They made a larger wagon version.
[www.toyota.com]

Shopping Southeast Pennsylvania, Delaware above the canal, and South Jersey since 2008

I only see a rav4 hybrid not a Prius suv?

Here's another link:
[cars.usnews.com]

I have rented a car for route shopping on a couple of occasions. They were renting cars with unlimited milage thru enterprize for less than $20 per day and it was totally worth it. So if I was driving a few hundred miles it saved wear and tear on my car and I would go to locations that I would not normally drive to. They need to be highly bonused shops however. I have not seen that rental deal for a couple of years now.

I don't rent a car unless there is a very compelling reason to. There is a significant amount of "profit" in the significantly reduced tax burden by taking my own vehicle.

As for the people mentioning Costco rental, have you ever checked Priceline? I check Costco, Priceline, and the major company sites themselves using a variety of discount codes and Priceline has beat out the other prices 100% of the times. I rent about 6-8 times a year and I can't remember the last time Priceline was not the cheapest, but it's been years.

There are reasons that a body stays in motion
At the moment only demons come to mind

@bgriffin wrote:

I don't rent a car unless there is a very compelling reason to. There is a significant amount of "profit" in the significantly reduced tax burden by taking my own vehicle.

As for the people mentioning Costco rental, have you ever checked Priceline? I check Costco, Priceline, and the major company sites themselves using a variety of discount codes and Priceline has beat out the other prices 100% of the times. I rent about 6-8 times a year and I can't remember the last time Priceline was not the cheapest, but it's been years.

Not in 10 years at least have I used Priceline.
Costco lets me make a reservation with no deposit and no cancellation penalty. I check the site frequently and drop and re-book at a cheaper rate if I find it. It's not worth saving a few $ to lose the ability to cancel with no penalty.

If you live near an airport, one thing to check is one-way rentals. Some brands do reduced rates one-way from an airport with a drop-off in town. I find it much more beneficial to rent directly from the brand instead of a third party, but it takes some effort to shop around. Sometimes the weekly rate will drop in half if I pick up a day earlier. You can also call around and ask for a manager's special.

I have wanted to do a long one-way rental and fly home. I did it once years ago. They comped a rental from Florida to Ohio. At certain times, they are overwhelmed by one-way rentals going the other direction.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/18/2020 08:48PM by 1cent.

@SoCalMama wrote:

Not in 10 years at least have I used Priceline.
Costco lets me make a reservation with no deposit and no cancellation penalty. I check the site frequently and drop and re-book at a cheaper rate if I find it. It's not worth saving a few $ to lose the ability to cancel with no penalty.

You can make a reservation on Priceline as well with no deposit or cancellation penalty. I have to admit I always use their Express Deals. I also book the day before, or sometimes day of when I know I won't need to cancel and the last few times I've rented the Priceline Express Deal has been about 1/2 of the Costco price and 1/3 of the individual car rental company sites.

There are reasons that a body stays in motion
At the moment only demons come to mind

I also like carrentals.com or rentalcars.com. I use those for comparison in addition to others. I have gotten some amazing deals over the years.

On occasion, Enterprise has a $9.99 a day weekend deal.[/quote]

Enterprise weekend rate of $9.99 is limited to 100 miles per day.

I don't rent unless there is a compelling reason to do so, such as: Needing a special car for a shop; flying into a new city and needing wheels; doing the rental as a shop... I do not believe it makes sense financially.

First, my car has great gas mileage, so any rental I get would have to be similar - or I'd be spending extra money on fuel. Second, yes it does cost a little bit of money to rent $20 is $20 and I don't do $20 of "wear and tear" in a single day of driving. Third, even if the finances were to break even (or slightly better), it takes time to rent the car. In the time I would spend reserving, picking up, and returning my rental, I could do two more shops.

Hard work builds character and homework is good for your soul.

I never plan to rent a car for this work. On a few occasions when car repairs and work nearly collided, I remembered that I could rent a car. Maybe. In this little town, rental hours are limited.

Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished. - Lao-Tzu

Toyota cars are pretty reliable. I drive a used Toyota Corolla with a lot of mileage and I've had no issues. Every time I take it in for maintenance, the mechanics always mentions that it's in very good condition.

@Niner wrote:

I have a Prius with almost 500k miles. If you need a reliable car, buy one of these. We have another newer one that has 137k over two and a half years.

@SoCalMama wrote:

Not in 10 years at least have I used Priceline.
Costco lets me make a reservation with no deposit and no cancellation penalty. I check the site frequently and drop and re-book at a cheaper rate if I find it. It's not worth saving a few $ to lose the ability to cancel with no penalty.

The pre-pay, submit your bid type of model died a couple years ago. Nearly all the third-parties offer no deposit, no cancellation penalties as well, but because of that, Costco is now more competitive in pricing.

Shopping the Greater Denver Area, Colorado Springs and in-between in Colorado. 33 year old male and willing to travel!

@Tarantado wrote:

@SoCalMama wrote:

Not in 10 years at least have I used Priceline.
Costco lets me make a reservation with no deposit and no cancellation penalty. I check the site frequently and drop and re-book at a cheaper rate if I find it. It's not worth saving a few $ to lose the ability to cancel with no penalty.

The pre-pay, submit your bid type of model died a couple years ago. Nearly all the third-parties offer no deposit, no cancellation penalties as well, but because of that, Costco is now more competitive in pricing.

I checked today. Right now, it's about $10 cheaper than Costco, but I won't get airline miles. Still, I'll keep checking for a bigger discount. Oh, it's cheaper for an off-brand, not a major brand. Alamo is cheaper through Costco right now.

@SoCalMama wrote:

I checked today. Right now, it's about $10 cheaper than Costco, but I won't get airline miles. Still, I'll keep checking for a bigger discount. Oh, it's cheaper for an off-brand, not a major brand. Alamo is cheaper through Costco right now.

Hahaha you definitely seem like a customer that doesn’t have patience using off-site rental companies!

So from my Oahu trip a couple weeks ago now, I decided to save $30 to grit my teeth and work with one of those smaller companies. Customer service and wait was absolutely terrible, but they upgraded me to a longer sedan and I ended using that $30 I saved choosing them on some rounds of Taro cocktails! Taro drink, coconut liqueur and rum!

Shopping the Greater Denver Area, Colorado Springs and in-between in Colorado. 33 year old male and willing to travel!

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/20/2020 04:27PM by Tarantado.

One side benefit if you decide to rent, don't forget to get your mileage points, either for the rental or towards airlines miles. It can end up to be a double benefit.

When you learn, teach, when you get, give. Maya Angelou

@CureMS wrote:

One side benefit if you decide to rent, don't forget to get your mileage points, either for the rental or towards airlines miles. It can end up to be a double benefit.

Always get your points, but here's some food for thought when it comes to points:

An actual sample from 2015:

Rental cost $45.15 paid with a card that offered 5% car rentals + $19.84 gas paid with a card that offered 5% gas = $64.99 total cost, all tax-deductible, $3.25 pocketed from cash back / miles equivalent.

If I would have used my personal vehicle: 227 total miles = $0.575/mile tax deduction rate for 2015 = $130.53 tax write-off. Gas would be around the same at $25 (for premium fuel), it would be a net $23.75 after accounting for 5% cash back or mileage equivalent.

bgriffin stated it already; it usually makes sense from a business perspective to just use our own vehicles for work instead of renting a car for it. For me, I prefer to pass on the wear and tear to another vehicle when it makes sense to me, even though I'm losing out on a tax benefit.

Shopping the Greater Denver Area, Colorado Springs and in-between in Colorado. 33 year old male and willing to travel!

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