Continuing my story about spending the summer in Estonia (see my profile and web site) I want to discuss how I address the need for a rental car during our entire summer. For our first summer abroad, in Kinsale Ireland, I rented a car from a well known US auto agency. Was I naive? With all the added fees I ended up paying over $4,000 for three months rental on a Korean four-banger. I learned my lesson. I begin looking for an alternative as soon as I have confirmed where I am going to stay or the summer. Often the rental agent or the person I am leasing from is very helpful in tracking down a used car rental agency, garage, or a separate individual looking to rent a used car for three months.
In Estonia the rental agent put me in touch with Hannes Kree who was in the used car rental business. We agreed on $17.50 a day for a 1992 Ford Mondeo station wagon with a full tank of gas, insurance, all taxes and unlimited mileage. That was about half what he normally gets for a short term rental and about five times less than I would have paid had I simply picked up a car at the airport.
Renting a used car for the long term and paying up front in cash really makes a difference. A mid-size Toyota from a front line agency would have been $90 a day, compared to my $17.50. When I had one minor mechanical problem with the Ford, Hannas picked it up, gave me a driver for the meantime, and fixed the problem in a day.
To paraphrase what George Forman says in his ad about mufflers, "I ain't gonna pay a lot for that car rental."
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