Rental cars .... (m)

[bajanswife]

First of all, can you help me decide what class of rental car we might need? I'm not that familiar with American cars! We will be 2 adults and 3 kids ages 3 - 6, so I guess we will have 1 in a car seat and 2 in boosters. Should we get a minivan just to be safe, or will a SUV or a full size be OK? I'm used to smaller Japanese cars, most of which won't fit 3 safety seats of any kind across the back.

Second, I want the cheapest possible rental I can get, since we'll need the car for 12 - 14 days! I cannot belong to AAA, and I will be flying only American. I also cannot join many American discount clubs, although I did join Southwest Airlines once to get the cheaper passes to Seaworld was it (or Universal??).

Any ideas? We'll be exchanging weeks at a timeshare offsite, so we will need a car for sure.

 

[cepmom]

I think a minivan would be your best bet if you need to have 3 kids in car/booster seats. We rented an SUV (it was a Chevy Blazer) last time and it was tight! We had 1 child in a high back booster,1 in a backless booster and our 3rd squished in between them (the 3rd child was 13 at the time - no need for a safety seat!)

I'm not sure about a full size fitting the 3 seats across the back though. Maybe someone else can help with that one.

Sometimes the rental agencies have good deals on minivan rentals...I think right now Budget has a weekly rate of $189 for minivans. I would suggest signing up for their email newsletters so you can keep up with the current specials. HTH

 

[mrsboz]

I would also highly recommend a minivan. I have three children and couldn't imagine getting something smaller. Where would you put your luggage? That rate that the other posted stated sounds like a real good deal.

 

[bajanswife]

Yes, a minivan would be ideal - it's just that they tend to be pricey to rent, so I was wondering if I really had to! I think I will. My parents will be with us and will have their own car, but it would be nice if they could join us from time to time if we all go somewhere together for a while. If I knew that we would always be going places together we'd each just rent an intermediate and split the kids up - but they will have their own agenda some of the time.

That's a good idea about getting the newsletters and watching the prices.

Can you get rental cars through any auction sites? Is this worth doing, or could we end up with a horrible rental company?

 

[aka-mad4themouse]

You can try Priceline.com for rental cars. Hotwire.com is another good site for name-your-own price rentals. The drawback is that you don't know what company you will be dealing with until after your price has been accepted and the deal is sealed. You could end up with one of the rental companies that is off-site or one that you would rather not deal with.

If you go to MouseSavers.com - How to Save Money on Your Rental Car , you will find active codes for all of the major rental companies in MCO. You might be able to find a good rate by combining different contract id #s and coupon codes. I happen to like National because it's onsite and I have a free membership to their Emerald Club thanks to the now-defunct Disney Club. I've been pretty successful getting decent rates from them using the Priceless Vacation code that is on the MouseSavers site.

Another good website is Rentalcodes.com . Not only do they provide contract id #s and coupon codes, they also provide links to the coupons so that you can print them out.

 

[turboshelbys]

found a discount code for a minivan rental through www.Alamo.com for Walt Disney World(MCO Orlando International Airport) for 129.90(plus surchages) a week! really hard to beat that deal.

Use
I.D. / Corp I.D. 803291
Rate/Product Code J1
Coupon Code D70B

Hope this helps. FYI i booked for Feb 7-14, so the codes are good for this year.