- Young whipsnappers may remember that you didn’t always have to take out a loan to rent a car for the weekend. Thankfully, prices are coming down after years of the pandemic, and there are deals to be had.
- Signs that the rental-car industry is changing can be found in recent expansion announcements, both with new cars being added to the fleet and more rental counters in more locations.
- We’ve got some deals from Sixt, Hertz, and Avis if you’re looking for floating wheels soon.
The rental car world is getting back to normal. These past few years brought us to the strangeness and unbelievably high prices inflicted by the pandemic. Remember that car rental that cost $200 a day or that unusual U-Haul life hack? But now rental car prices are coming back down to earth, and some companies are offering deals for your temporary wheels.
EVs, luxury cars entering the fleet
One way to see how things are progressing is through recent news about increased capacity. For example, Hertz announced this week that it will add 2100 electric vehicles to its Houston fleet, nearly tripling the number of EVs available in the area. Hertz is also building a new fast-charging hub at Houston Hobby Airport. So far this year, Sixt has announced several new North American locations, including Washington, DC, Pittsburgh and Toronto, and says it will announce further expansion plans later this year. In February, peer-to-peer car-sharing service Turo said it was adjusting its maps for where it expects to see increased demand for vacation rentals for its vehicles, along the Carolina coast in 2023. One such hotspot was predicted to happen.
A resurgence is also happening globally, for example, with Dubai’s luxury-car rentals “skyrocketing”. Vietnamese conglomerate VinGroup, which owns new EV brand VinFast, announced earlier this month that it has set up a new joint stock company called GSM (which stands for Green Smart Mobility) to rent out VinFast EVs. Will focus on buying as well as renting VinFast’s scooters. and operating a taxi service. As you may be able to guess, with all this revitalization activity, there are now deals to be had if you need to rent a car soon. Here are some options that may fit your plans.
some deals
Sixt is offering mid-week and regional deals as well as discounts on luxury vehicles at all of its locations until the end of June. Midweek deals—up to 30 percent off—are available to anyone who starts their rental on Sunday, Monday, or Tuesday and ends on Thursday. Or you can choose to get up to 25 percent off the rental cost of a premium or luxury vehicle or “extraordinary” category. Some Regional Sixt offices are also offering discounts of up to 25 percent. None of these six deals are available from April 2 to 22, also known as prime spring break travel week.
Avis doesn’t have quite as many deals as the Sixt right now, but you can get $15 off if you spend $175 or more on a rental that lasts three days or more.
If you need a car for a week or longer, Hertz is offering one free day if you rent for five days. The company is also offering up to 30 percent off on your fare if you choose to drive an EV. It’s worth plugging in, maybe.
contributing editor
Sebastian Blanco has been writing about electric vehicles, hybrid and hydrogen cars since 2006. New York Times, Automotive News, Reuters, SAE, Autoblog, InsideEVs, Trucks.com, Car Talk, and other outlets. His first green-car media event was the launch of the Tesla Roadster, and since then he has been tracking the move away from gasoline-powered vehicles and exploring the new technology’s importance not only to the auto industry, but to the entire world. have been , Throw in the recent shift to autonomous vehicles, and there are more interesting changes happening than most people can wrap their heads around. You can find him on Twitter or on good days behind the wheel of a new EV.