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Surely cars are rented far, far more often for travel reasons than car repair reasons. I think I've only ever rented a car for car repair [mechanical or body]

Surely cars are rented far, far more often for travel reasons than car repair reasons. I think I've only ever rented a car for car repair [mechanical or body] reasons once, at that was a mechanical breakdown while I was about 350 miles from home, so I had to leave it at a shop and rent a car to continue the trip. Meanwhile, I've rented cars almost once a month for business or personal travel reasons.

Retric 3y ago
There’s 6.1 million police reported vehicle accidents in the US each year with most involving more than 1 vehicles. Average to say 1 car for 1.5 weeks for 6 million accidents which then cluster around snowstorms etc and you easily need 200,000+ rental cars just for that purpose. But let’s take your use case, how many of those involved driving more than 300 miles per day? Or even total?
- sokoloff 3y ago
  US passenger embarkations are around 800 million per year. For business travelers, that's likely a car rental per 4 flights maximum (most of mine are one rental per two flights). For leisure travel, it might be one per 10 flights (families probably rent only one car and might be more willing to take connecting flights to save money). I think these are orders of magnitude more common in use case than car repair related rentals. > But let’s take your use case, how many of those involved driving more than 300 miles per day? Or even total? Less than 10% of them. We would sometimes fly into one city and drive around a country or into Fort Lauderdale, rent a car, drive to Key West, and make our way back over the following week. But even if I don't drive more than an EV's range, I would still need to be certain that the EV left Hertz fully charged and that Hertz was OK with me bringing it back empty. The former sure doesn't seem to be happening based on discussions in this page and if they allow the latter, the former becomes harder to ensure. (I daily drive an EV, have for almost a decade, and love it. Even I don't want to rent an EV when I travel.)
  - Retric 3y ago
    Hertz completely fucked up renting an EV. There’s zero question about that, but pick one up at 80+% bring it back at 5% should definitely be the plan to pull it off successfully. If you can’t guarantee the car is mostly charged I’m not going to rent an EV. > per 4 flights > it might be one per 10 flights. Both of those seem like massive overestimates to me. I’ve flown for business and pleasure and never rented a car after flying. My sister probably does 100 flights a year and rents a car once or twice when traveling with her husband. I know plenty of people who’ve completely given up on renting a car on vacation. Uber or public transit is just far less of a hassle, and when visiting family why have a car? Run the numbers for 1.5 hour long Uber ride vs 4 day car rental and you might as well just relax. Further most travelers aren’t going to rent for as long. Few business travelers are going to use a car for a full week but repairs or finding a new car takes a while.
    - Retric 3y ago
      PS: In support of my point compare the relatively tiny space for rentals at airports with the vast number of people parking their cars, going through loading or unloading from public transport, cabs, or people picking them up / dropping them off. In your model there should be what 1/2 the people at an airport taking a rental at their destination and the other half being at home. When instead it’s closer to 1/50th, which granted is still lots of people just far less.

Retric 3y ago

There’s 6.1 million police reported vehicle accidents in the US each year with most involving more than 1 vehicles. Average to say 1 car for 1.5 weeks for 6 million accidents which then cluster around snowstorms etc and you easily need 200,000+ rental cars just for that purpose. But let’s take your use case, how many of those involved driving more than 300 miles per day? Or even total?

sokoloff 3y ago
US passenger embarkations are around 800 million per year. For business travelers, that's likely a car rental per 4 flights maximum (most of mine are one rental per two flights). For leisure travel, it might be one per 10 flights (families probably rent only one car and might be more willing to take connecting flights to save money). I think these are orders of magnitude more common in use case than car repair related rentals. > But let’s take your use case, how many of those involved driving more than 300 miles per day? Or even total? Less than 10% of them. We would sometimes fly into one city and drive around a country or into Fort Lauderdale, rent a car, drive to Key West, and make our way back over the following week. But even if I don't drive more than an EV's range, I would still need to be certain that the EV left Hertz fully charged and that Hertz was OK with me bringing it back empty. The former sure doesn't seem to be happening based on discussions in this page and if they allow the latter, the former becomes harder to ensure. (I daily drive an EV, have for almost a decade, and love it. Even I don't want to rent an EV when I travel.)
- Retric 3y ago
  Hertz completely fucked up renting an EV. There’s zero question about that, but pick one up at 80+% bring it back at 5% should definitely be the plan to pull it off successfully. If you can’t guarantee the car is mostly charged I’m not going to rent an EV. > per 4 flights > it might be one per 10 flights. Both of those seem like massive overestimates to me. I’ve flown for business and pleasure and never rented a car after flying. My sister probably does 100 flights a year and rents a car once or twice when traveling with her husband. I know plenty of people who’ve completely given up on renting a car on vacation. Uber or public transit is just far less of a hassle, and when visiting family why have a car? Run the numbers for 1.5 hour long Uber ride vs 4 day car rental and you might as well just relax. Further most travelers aren’t going to rent for as long. Few business travelers are going to use a car for a full week but repairs or finding a new car takes a while.
  - Retric 3y ago
    PS: In support of my point compare the relatively tiny space for rentals at airports with the vast number of people parking their cars, going through loading or unloading from public transport, cabs, or people picking them up / dropping them off. In your model there should be what 1/2 the people at an airport taking a rental at their destination and the other half being at home. When instead it’s closer to 1/50th, which granted is still lots of people just far less.