YSK: You might save on car rental by cancelling and re-booking over time before your rental due date

Car rental prices might decrease over time as the rental getting closer to its due date.

I encountered it when booked a car rental, waited for about a month, cancelled and then re-booked again.

These are the rental prices over the months before the rental due date:

11 comments

Yup, I did this every year when I was going to the states for 3-4 weeks in summer. I started booking in January, then about every week I checked the price for the same summer date, in general it was cheaper so I cancelled/rebooked, multiple times.
- Also instead of rent from airport, I rent from smaller places (that handle Hertz/Enterprise/National/etc) and I always booked a subcompact, and 50% of the time they had none and gave me a compact/full size car. I had multiple Yaris yes, but one time I got a Dodge Caravan, a Fusion Sport V6, a Flex, a Jetta, a Soul, etc.
  
  Similar happened to me, I booked a gas car but received a hybrid instead.
  
  I'm curious, what's the advantage of renting not from the airport? I prefer the airport because it's easy to locate, especially when the airport is new and I'm dizzy after long flights
They don't charge a cancellation fee?
- I think it's usually free cancellation if the cancellation is more than x days before rental starts for many car rental companies in the US.
- For me they didn't, it was free cancelation until 48 hours before the rental due date
Obviously, check the price before booking. I assume like most things here it can either go up or down as you get closer depending on demand.
- Yeah.
  
  I checked the price, I booked, and then cancelled the previous one.

11 comments