Hi guys! I'm planning a road trip in California this fall and I need to rent a car.
Do you haven any experience with Budget Car Rental? It seems to be the cheapest with insurance included. Or could you recommend reliable company which offers reasonable prices? I'm thinking of renting in Los Angeles and dropping it off in San Francisco after almost two weeks. Do you think it will make the price much higher? Is it better to start and end in SF? I'd be grateful for any advice!
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Karolina,
Renting from Los ANgeles and dropping off in San Francisco will be about double the price (maybe $50/day versus $20/day). You can take a bus between San Francisco and Los Angeles for about $20, so it will be much cheaper to return to Los Angeles after a week, then take a bus to San Francisco and rent from there for a week.
The $20/day rental rates include taxes and fees but NOT the Loss/Collision Damage Waiver (which is normally covered by your credit card for free so you do not need to pay the extra $10-$20/day for that), or the Supplemental Insurance Liability ( which is required for rentals in California, and is not often covered by rental agencies -- though I believe Hertz does cover this for foreign drivers). If you do not have this SLI coverage, it can be costly to get it from the car rental agency (maybe $20-$30 extra per day).
You may want to check with travel agencies in Poland to see if they have special deals that have better rates that allow for drop-off in San Francisco and also include LDW/CDW and SLI coverage. I have heard from Polish Couchsurfers they were able to get better deals this way. Check with them, but ask about the CDW/LDW (ask your credit card about CDW/LDW as well) and Supplemental Liability Insurance.
I used www.kayak.com to search for car rental rates. When you select the city, choose "Los Angeles, CA" and NOT "Los Angeles (LAX), CA" which will default to airport locations first and may have higher rates. The same with "San Francisco, CA" instead of "San Francisco (SFO), CA"
Budget Car Rental is fine and is similar to the other major car rental agencies (Hertz, Avis, Dollar, Thrifty, National, Enterprise, Alamo). I have heard some have had some problems with Fox when renting out of the SF Bay Area, but I have no experience with them.
When you are visiting Los Angeles and San Francisco, you will not need a car every day. In fact, it is sometimes a disadvantage to have a car when you need to find parking or drive through traffic, and it may be better to use Lyft or Uber to get around. A car will be more useful in Los Angeles since there are bigger distances between tourist attractions, but I think you can certainly get away without a car in San Francisco. A lot depends on where you are staying and whether you have easy access to public transportation or can get rides from others.
Do you plan to use the car mainly for getting around the cities or do you plan to make longer trips outside of the cities (for example, to get to National Parks)?
-Mike
Edit:
Hah! I was just in Warszawa a few days ago! Came back after a visit to Rzeszow and Stockholm (it was much cheaper flying to Los Angeles by Lot from Stockholm via Warszawa, than directly from WAW).
If you fly into SFO and plan to visit National Parks like Yosemite, Seauoia/Kings Canyon, then you can rent a car from San Francisco for about $40/day from Hertz, who will cover the minimum Supplemental Liability Insurance required for foreign drivers. Here is a link to their policy:
I do not think othet car rental agencies here cover this charge for free. Check your credit card company to see if they cover the CDW/LDW fee for free.
You can return the car to San Francisco, then take the bus to Los Angeles, or do a short two day rental with a drop-off in Los Angeles but drive along the Pacific Coast to get there (there is a section south of Big Sur that is closed and you have to drive inland).
From Los Angeles you can rent a car for a week for about $30/day and go to Las Vegas and then the Grand Canyon, Zion and Bryce Canyon and Death Valley National Parks, if you have the time.
Dear Mike,
thank you for your reply and so much information! The thing is that San Francisco is our first and last stop because of the flights. We want to spend couple of days in San Francisco and in Los Angeles and then focus on the national parks. We wanted to take a night bus from SF to LA, because we assumed that we would't need a car in the cities. I tried to compare prices in the car rentals online and it seems that dropping the car off in a different location but the same state wouldn't be much more expensive. But still I'm afraid of hidden costs. It will be my first time in USA and I don't have any experience with renting a car, co I don't know what to expect. So according to you it would be easier to rent it on our last day in San Francisco and return it there?
Unfortunately we don't have much time and we want to see the highlights of California and make a stop in Arizona and Nevada. It's one of my dreams to see the Grand Canyon! So we're starting in San Francisco, then LA, after that we want to drive Route 66 on the way to Las Vegas where we will stay for one night, then Grand Canyon, Antelope Canyon and Horsehoe Bend, Death Valley, Sequoia National Park, Yosemite and back to SF to catch our flight. It will probably be quite hectic, but this kind of road trip is our big dream. So yes - we will need a car for most of our stay.
Regards from Warsaw!
Edit:
Rzeszow is so close to my hometown! I hope you enjoyed it. Thank you again for all the tips, I want our journey to start already. Can't wait!
All the best