Renting a van for family vacation?

I've never rented a vehicle in my life, but the Fit won't fit all-6 of us at once and DC is a bit far to take 2 cars. There's an Enterprise up the street from work, and their mobile site shows $359 unlimited mileage.

Are there any "hidden fees" I should be expecting? What about discounts, any easy way to get one?

Check with your CC and/or regular auto insurance to make sure you are covered when renting. Enterprise will push hard to get you to buy theirs. Likely some wonky taxes/fees will be added (airport location convenience, hospitality tax, we need a new stadium to keep the local team happy fee, but it's for the children, etc). I suggest calling directly, they should be able to give you a full quote.

Check with your insurance before you go to the rental place. Your insurance will let you know if you need any of the rental company's insurance. Hopefully you won't; E36 M3s expensive.

Enterprise's 'unlimited mileage' typically restricts you to the state the car was rented and surrounding states.

You can often successfully request that this be extended to include your intended destination - but I'd do so before the 11th hour.

You don't want to have a breakdown or accident beyond the geographic limits of your rental agreement.

Otherwise, I find Enterprise relatively easy to deal with.

Just watch out for mileage or state limitations. I've done it several times and while I didn't get the dream van of my choice it worked out very well.

If you are a Costco member, Costco Travel is often worth a try for getting lower rates.

I've had a similar experience with Enterprise and their unlimited mileage. I just booked a minivan for a family trip for this purpose and our lowest rate came from Hertz. Off-airport locations are way cheaper than on-airport.

szeis4cookie wrote: If you are a Costco member, Costco Travel is often worth a try for getting lower rates. I've had a similar experience with Enterprise and their unlimited mileage. I just booked a minivan for a family trip for this purpose and our lowest rate came from Hertz. Off-airport locations are way cheaper than on-airport.

This. Try to find a rental car joint that isn't at an airport, even if you have to go to the next town over.

You should also check into local rental places since you are going round trip. Often they are more relaxed with the rules and regulations. (I have used them when I need to tow something with a pickup)

In reply to petegossett:

Definately call your local shop directly - I rented a mini van for a 5+ hour trip each way trip over New Years - it paid for itself and thensome in fuel savings and convenience of packing and of taking 1 vehicle out each day. I was surprised at the price difference from 2 rental places less than 10 miles a part (both Enterprise) and the difference from the online price - I called both and went with the cheaper one (the more expensive place couldn't match - I asked). I want to say the cheaper one was 60% the rental rate of the other one. That was after calling a few other companies just to compare rates. And Enterprise showed a higher rate for that vehicle at that location than they gave me when I called them directly.

Lots of good advise here so far.
Number 1, keep away from the airport locations where there an huge fees, taxes put in place by most tourism boards, airport authorities and local municipalities. The intention is to put additional fees/taxes on people who do not live there and therefore do not have a vote or a voice to bitch about it.

Enterprise state limits:
I can not prove this but it seems to me that Enterprise employees are encouraged to get the customer to voluntarily place limits on how far they will take the car. I am sure this results in a reduced insurance policy to Enterprise (and a savings that is not passed on to the consumer.)

Maybe not good for your trip to DC but foer other readers; be mindful of these two Hertz deals for fly out and drive back.
Out of Fl for as low as $29.99 Minivan
Out of AZ for as low as $17.99 day

Hertz ends up with too many cars in popular vacation spots and instead of loading them on car carriers to move the to more remote areas, they give you a reduced rate and you drive it there for them.

carguy123 wrote: Just watch out for mileage or state limitations. I've done it several times and while I didn't get the dream van of my choice it worked out very well.

Here is another scam you can pull on Hertz to get the car you want.
When you pick up the car in the suburbs, they may not have exactly what you want. The real selection is at the airports. As you travel, pull into a Hertz airport location, tell them the car is shaking at highway speeds (similar to a tire out of balance.) Be very kind and nice about it. They will bend over backwards to make you happy and put you into another car (and many to choose from.)
They may check out the car later but as you know, they will find nothing wrong.

This soes not work with Enterprise because for them, unlike Hertz, the vehicles are typically "owned" by the branch office, so no swapping (they will send you to a shop to get it fixed.) Hertz's vehicles are all company owned and therefore easily swappable.

Weekends are cheaper because most rental are for business reasons. Because of this, you may find that a 5 day rental is the same price as a 7day "weekly" rent. If this is the case and your time away is not a full week, you may still just want to rent for 7 days. Just drive the car to work or around town for the last two days.

There are no "pre-paid gas" options that favor the consumer unless you consider "convenience" to the consumer. You will however pay dearly for the "convenience."

I had to rent a van for our family in San Antonio. We were all flying in to SA for a little vacation and there were 8 of us. I posted on SA craigslist that I wanted to rent a van for the week, listed the parameters, offered someone $200, and sure enough several people responded. We ended up with an old 1982 GMC conversion van. I gave the guy my DL number and insurance info (after I made sure we were covered), we signed a generic contract that he had bought at Office Max, gave him $200 up front, and we were set. He even picked us up at the airport and drove us back.

I even remember the guy's name - Beau Buckminster. I remember thinking it sounded so regal, but he lived in a trailer park with goats. Come to think of it, the van kinda smelled like goats.

Make sure you talk to the store you will pick it up at and that they are absolutely clear that you want a minivan and not just a large vehicle. I tried this twice and Enterprise and Hertz both screwed it up. Hertz gave me an Explorer when I said repeatedly I had 6 adults and Enterprise cave me a cargo van for the same 6 adults. The Explorer was a pain in the ass, though we did ok with the cargo van putting my couch and a bean bag chair in the back.

Thanks for the advice!

Fortunately there aren't any active airports in our county, so no worries there. I called the local Enterprise as there are no Hertz locations here either, the girl on the phone confirmed there were no extra/hidden fees and that the mileage was unlimited(I stated we were going on family vacation for a week, but did not state where - she never asked either). I asked if they had any discounts for VA/government employees or veterans, and they do have a 10% veteran's discount so thanks to my wife we saved a bit there. She also confirmed it would be a Dodge/Chrysler minivan, which is what I was looking for.

We even received a callback about an hour later to confirm our reservation and pickup time. So far so good. Hopefully I won't need to map out the Enterprise locations along our route to DC.

And Curtis - I would love to try pulling something like that with my wife(once, it would never happen again), but I sure don't want that for a 1400-mile round trip!

Seems risky to not be explicitly clear that you will cross state lines.