6 Week Car Hire in USA

skweeble

Hi,

My friend and I are going on a tour of America for 6 weeks from 1st August 2008 until 12th September 2008. We will be driving to all 48 states and covering about 20,000 miles, so will need a hire with unlimited milage, and we want both of us to be able to drive (We are both over 25+). We want a convertable car. What I want to know is:

Most of the hire companies advertise unlimited milage, but is it really unlimited (or subject to fair usage policy like our UK 'unlimited' broadband) because doing the sort of milage we plan on doing the car is going to miss 1, or maybe 2 services!!

Also, are there any states which are cheaper to rent cars from? We haven't booked our flights yet, so it is a case of weighing up flight prices and rental prices!!

Can anyone suggest a few places I can get quotes from, or companies they have used before that have been cheap?

Many Thanks,

John

steveo3002

just a thought

instead of missing a service or two....why not rent 3 differant cars for 2 weeks each?

id imagine theres some clause that states you return the car when the service light is on

blindman

skweeble wrote: »

Hi,

My friend and I are going on a tour of America for 6 weeks from 1st August 2008 until 12th September 2008. We will be driving to all 48 states and covering about 20,000 miles, so will need a hire with unlimited milage, and we want both of us to be able to drive (We are both over 25+). We want a convertable car. What I want to know is:

Most of the hire companies advertise unlimited milage, but is it really unlimited (or subject to fair usage policy like our UK 'unlimited' broadband) because doing the sort of milage we plan on doing the car is going to miss 1, or maybe 2 services!!

Also, are there any states which are cheaper to rent cars from? We haven't booked our flights yet, so it is a case of weighing up flight prices and rental prices!!

Can anyone suggest a few places I can get quotes from, or companies they have used before that have been cheap?

Many Thanks,

John

You could start in the States that allow one way drop offs for no fee

Airline network Allow this

There is no fee for one way rentals within the states of Florida and California, or for one way rentals between the states of California, Arizona and Nevada.

Or you could look into the Auto Drive Aways

mountainchrisriver

Did a 3 month trip over to the states I a few years ago... my advice would be to hire before you go over... it worked out cheaper to do that and I got an all inclusive price so no hidden extra charges (watch for insurance especially)... think alamo came out tops but like I say this was a few years ago! Do check out any clauses for taking cars interstate... Also if the service light comes on (it did whilst I was hiring) just had to drop it into the nearest rental place and they swapped it for another car (actually gave me a double free upgrade for the hassle!). Unlimited mileage was just that... unlimited... and I too covered a fair distance... think 20000 miles in only 6 weeks will be pushing it a bit... thats a lot of distance each day; many, many hours behind the wheel and very little time to appreciate/explore the best bits of the US (yes there are some!!).

Good luck!

Andy_L

Assuming you obey the 55mph speed limit thats ~8.5 hours of driving a day!

philhuff

Pah! 8.5 hours? That's nothing!

Just done a drive to Rome (via Luzern, Aprica and Venice) and back (via Geneva) in seven days in a car that cost £51!

Longest day was Rome to Geneva, taking 12 hours, while Geneva back home was 10.5 hours, and they were alone. The first five days were just as long, but the driving was shared out.

Back to the original question, take a look at YesCarHire.com - I've used them repeatedly, and they've always been superb on price. In the US they were using Alamo Gold, and it was well under half the price you would pay locally.

BlueVinney

Hi skweeble,

Few thoughts.

Is the holiday just to drive the car? If not you'll miss out on all the great sights there are in the USA by trying to drive so far in that time. Just seeing the Grand Canyon, Yosemite, San Fransisco, Vegas and all the other great places in the West seems a great pity and you'll need at least a day to appreciate most. Then there is the east coast as well and Texas has a few things you would enjoy and what about .............

Remember the cost of fuel. Unleaded must be at least $3 a gallon and the US gallon is is only around 80% of ours. You car is unlikely to do more than 30 miles/gallon so add $2000 to motoring cost.

I've also found yescarhire very good using the Alamo Gold deal. It covers all the problems of top-up insurance and multiple drivers in the rate. Pay in the UK for the best deal.

Enjoy your stay.

iolanthe07

Assuming you obey the 55mph speed limit

What 55 mph speed limit? This was abolished many years ago. The speed limit varies considerably, but on most freeways it is the same as ours - 70 mph

skweeble

Thanks for all the answers, it is much appreciated...

I know there is a hell of a lot of driving to be done, and we have done lots of research on speed limits, and distances. We have got a massive map which we have put pins in for each sight and destination we want to go to... We have even gone as far as to do an online route plan for the distance and travelling time between each sight, which takes into account freeways and town driving etc.. and have allowed quite a bit extra in miles for for getting lost and going exploring etc.. So 20,000 miles would be a maximum, the actual route worked out at just over 15,000 miles, and it is better to plan for more then we need. There will be plenty of time to see everything, as there are 2 of us driving. We estimate about 6 - 7 hours a day on the road, 8 hours sleeping, which still leaves 9 hours a day to see stuff... To save money we plan on spending every other night sleeping in the car anyway, so if we are short on time we can take turns in sleeping and driving..

Looking at the post about getting several different cars, it is more expensive to hire a car on a one way basis, and by the looks of things, it is cheaper to book before hand, so we cant really do several different cars as we will not know exactly where or when we will need to change them.

Thanks for the reminder about the fuel costs, but we have got that planned as well.. we have researched fuel prices by state as well so we can work out a true cost.. Just hope the fuel prices stay the same between now and then, coz if the UK is anything to go by!!

I have looked on yescarhire, who were originally the planned company to use, but what prompted me to start this post was that you can not book a car from New York, which is where we were planning on starting...

I will just have to keep checking flight prices and find a new point to start from.

blindman

BTW

We will be driving to all 48 states

There are 50 US States

(I assume you're not doing Alaska or Hawaii)

If the plan is just to travel through them cheaply then look at China Buses.

You could start with them from New York.

Unless you do round trips or schedule in the Auto Driveaways then I can't see how you can drive across the US without doing one way car hire trips