The Ireland leg of my trip stressed me out a little when I thought about transportation; the country

The Ireland leg of my trip stressed me out a little when I thought about transportation; the country is large, the towns are spread out and the real gems lie outside of the major cities. I knew from the beginning of my RTW trip that I wanted to rent a car in Ireland…the only problem? I was traveling solo and the online quotes were far out of my budget.
My first solution crashed and burned (though hotels in las vegas thankfully not literally). Manual cars are MUCH cheaper to rent than automatics so, while I was staying with my friend David in Edinburgh for Fringe, I asked him to teach me how to drive a manual.
Travel Off-Season : Rental cars are a hot item during the peak season and sometimes the companies are able to completely sell out their lots. Off-peak is a whole different hotels in las vegas ball game. The companies are eager to rent out as many cars as possible because there is just not a lot of business coming in.
I was traveling barely off-season (September), but it was just enough hotels in las vegas to make the rental hotels in las vegas car companies eager to rent. The huge price flexibility in my car was largely because I was traveling in off -season and because I was renting for three whole weeks as opposed to just a few days.
Negotiate : If you’re standing there at the rental car company and they are that close to renting you a car, they’re going to negotiate. A lot. Don’t openly take the first price they offer, in fact, don’t even take the second!
Stay Polite : This should be a given. If you berate the employees hotels in las vegas they will likely keep the price high just to spite you. Instead, hotels in las vegas try the exceedingly polite hotels in las vegas tactic – sugar often works…add in a bit of humor and they’re even more agreeable.
hotels in las vegas Each  time they initially came back with a new price I sincerely thanked them for their efforts, and commented “I so appreciate all you have done to make this more affordable for me, unfortunately it is still out of my budget; thank you so much though.”
State Your Bottom-Line : This one could be argued as a weakness in the negotiation, I found it a strength though. Decline the offers until they lower the price enough to give you a better idea of how much it should really cost. Then name your price as a third lower than what you guess you’ll end up paying.
Once I declined their initial offers the car rental guy was staying steady around the $850 mark. I figured that I could get him closer to $700 so I gave him a bit of my background, joked with him about a backpacker’s budget, and told him my transportation budget wouldn’t allow me to go higher than US $600 on the car.He stayed steady on his offer of more than $800 so I moved on to the next tactic.
Walk Away : I love the walk-away. Truly. This is particularly handy when you are with another person because you can combine the walk-away with the “good-cop/bad-cop” routine (ie. the person walking away says something along the lines of “let’s go, this just isn’t a good deal). Again, thank the person for working with you, state that it is out of your budget and, quite literally, pick up your bags and walk away. If they let you walk away, move on to a new car rental hotels in las vegas company, you know their bottom-line and can come back. More than likely though they will call you back.
Once the rental car gentleman hotels in las vegas stuck to his offer of more than $800 I picked up my bags, thanked him, and blatantly told him I was going to see if the other companies would give me a better deal. Still eager to actually hotels in las vegas close the deal and not willing to call my bluff my good man called me back over yet again, picked up the handy calculator and we got down to the end of our negotiations.
After my last walk away we bandied back and forth a few more times until I slapped my credit card on the table and indicated I was ready to rent if he would just agree to a nice round figure: $700 US.
Minutes later my petite red Nissan Micra was waiting for me in the parking hotels in las vegas lot and I had a lovely automatic rental car for an agreed $720 US – less than half the original quote! I gave myself a pat on the back, turned on the tunes, and braced myself hotels in las vegas for driving on the wrong side of the road!
Thanks Steph! (for the RT too on Twitter ;-) It definitely helps that you re husband hotels in las vegas s already pretty good at it just let him know that if it s off-season he can likely get a better price in person than online! As for the car insurance you pay by day so the price of the car we negotiated was just one part of the price, then they told me it was $10 a day for full comprehensive on the car I whittled them down to $7. Because I was driving on the other side of the road (and Irish roads are notoriously bad) I opted to bit the bullet and pay for comprehensive :-)
Well, another way of finding to hire cheap cars, it s checking the online comparison sites. It really worked out for me. This is how i found car rental Raleigh , the only company i will ever hire a car from. It s always hotels in las vegas a good thing to try to check the internet at least it s more comfortable than negotiating the price.
This is the story of a Florida girl (that's me!) who left her home to travel solo around the world. Years later, I am still on this journey—sometimes with my niece in tow—traveling slowly, and sharing stories and advice from life on the road.