Peter Greenberg: California Car Rental

By: Peter Greenberg | Source: AARP.org | 2009-02-16

I will be traveling to LAX [Los Angeles International Airport] in March and want to rent a car for a couple of days and drop it off in Long Beach, Calif., prior to my cruise, instead of driving all the way back to LAX to turn the car in and then back to the ship. One-way rentals fees seem excessive; do you have any suggestions?
–Dave, Niskayuna, N.Y.

Actually, Dave, there is a fairly simple solution that might save you some money. Instead of renting your car at LAX, you can almost certainly get a better price if you rent in Long Beach, Calif., at a non-airport location that's relatively close to the pier.

You would take a shuttle (or taxi) from LAX to the car-rental place in Long Beach and pick up your car. Then you'd return the car to Long Beach before your cruise, and the rental car place might be able to drop you off at the pier. If not, it would surely be a quick, relatively cheap cab ride there.

You'd go between LAX and Long Beach the same number of times either way, but renting from a non-airport location and avoiding one-way rental fees would almost certainly save you money.

Alternatively, if you haven't already booked your tickets, fly into Long Beach Airport, which boasts a decent roster of flights and would make the process of going from the airport to the car rental place to the pier much easier.