The Chainlink

zipcar or igo?

Now that I no longer own a car, I was wondering if anyone had any insight on which service they prefer to use. Prices and locations seem similar.

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Permalink Reply by Kevin C Dormant on February 27, 2011 at 6:25pm
Traditional rental car agencies ARE cheaper for trips longer than 3 or 4 hours, depending on what you want to rent. Here are Enterprise rates for 24-hour rentals for a variety of vehicles. Even factoring in additional rental car costs for comprehensive insurance and fuel, car sharing cost structure seems to only make sense for very short durations.

Jared said:

I have an I-Go membership.  With few exceptions I only use it to go to estate sales on Fridays to buy books to resell.  Last week I hit up a sale in Portage Park which could of easily been done by bike but the rest on my list were all in the suburbs, Elmhurst, Cicero, Stickney, Schiller Park and Niles.  Easily over 100 miles and much too many books to carry on the back of my bike. 

 

It's about $78 a day (the price tops out at that after about eight hours) which personally I think is a bit pricy so I'm not about to use it unless I have a really good reason.  Some people here seemed to indicate that traditional rental agencies are cheaper which doesn't really make sense since I-Go appears to have lower operating costs.

Permalink Reply by Jared on February 27, 2011 at 6:34pm
^Out of curiosity I looked up a 24 hr rental for next week, cheapest car is a Chevy Aveo or something like that and that was $74.  Not much cheaper, unless there's something I'm missing.
Permalink Reply by Kevin C Dormant on February 27, 2011 at 6:39pm
I don't know what your days are, but I get the Aveo picked up at noon on Friday, return noon on Saturday at $49.33/day.

Jared said:
^Out of curiosity I looked up a 24 hr rental for next week, cheapest car is a Chevy Aveo or something like that and that was $74.  Not much cheaper, unless there's something I'm missing.
Permalink Reply by Jared on February 27, 2011 at 6:58pm
Ah, I was looking at the Logan Blvd. location.  Apparently there is quite a bit of difference in rates between the different locations.
Permalink Reply by Michele on February 27, 2011 at 7:58pm

I-Go has Toyota Tacoma pick up trucks. I've reserved one for some furniture moving next weekend.

 

I have found that by the time I add in gas and insurance, renting a car in the city for the day is about the same or more expensive than an I-Go. If I took the train to O'Hare a rental might be cheaper, but for me, it's not worth the hassle. What I like about I-Go is being able to walk to a car, wave my magic card over the dash, and drive off!

Permalink Reply by h' Zerocats on February 27, 2011 at 10:21pm

Menards has a truck for rent and the nice thing about it is they rent it by the hour instead of all day.

 

Never fails-- someone who has no experience living car free jumps in right at this point and posts that you can rent a truck from _________ building center.

You can not rent a truck from Menard's or Home Depot unless you already have auto insurance.

Been through this over and over.

Permalink Reply by h' Zerocats on February 27, 2011 at 10:25pm

Enclosed vehicle wouldn't cut it for the things I need a truck for.


Anne Alt said:

The closest thing I-Go has to a truck is the Honda Element, which has quite a lot of hauling capacity.  It's not quite the equivalent of a truck or full-sized van, but it's as large as I ever need.

Permalink Reply by h' Zerocats on February 27, 2011 at 10:33pm
Ah, so I see. There are two in Chicago. One near Evanston, and one near Eerie and Ashland, which is about 45 minutes by bus with luck, or 30 by bike.  Considering the cost of the whole prospect, it would have to be closer to be worth considering membership.
Michele Beaulieux said:

I-Go has Toyota Tacoma pick up trucks. I've reserved one for some furniture moving next weekend.

Permalink Reply by Far'arned Retrogrumpalunkus #63 on February 28, 2011 at 6:45am

You CAN buy auto insurance without owning a car.  It covers you whenever you drive any vehicle and umbrella insurance like this is not very expensive.  It will also cover you if you smash into a car on your bike and (as much as many bikers feel this is impossible) it is your fault because one made a mistake in traffic and actually caused the accident.  

 

If I were renting cars/trucks out I wouldn't want to rent out to people who were such non-drivers that they didn't even carry any insurance.  I'd put that down in the 'bad risk" category.  Just a sound business practice. 

Permalink Reply by Anne Alt on February 28, 2011 at 7:31am
It also depends on timing.  Sometimes they're offering cheaper deals, sometimes not.

Jared said:
Ah, I was looking at the Logan Blvd. location.  Apparently there is quite a bit of difference in rates between the different locations.
Permalink Reply by Anne Alt on February 28, 2011 at 7:32am
That must be relatively new, presumably in response to member demand.

H3N3 said:
Ah, so I see. There are two in Chicago. One near Evanston, and one near Eerie and Ashland, which is about 45 minutes by bus with luck, or 30 by bike.  Considering the cost of the whole prospect, it would have to be closer to be worth considering membership.
Michele Beaulieux said:

I-Go has Toyota Tacoma pick up trucks. I've reserved one for some furniture moving next weekend.

Permalink Reply by Duppie on February 28, 2011 at 8:21am

Renting at an airport is always a bad idea. Airports in general are more expensive, since politicians have figured out that business and tourist travelers don't vote. So you can levy taxes on them with impunity.

 

I you can avoid the busy times, and you can plan ahead, you can get great deals with neighborhood rental places. When I did the math, it always worked in car rental places favor.



Michele Beaulieux said:

If I took the train to O'Hare a rental might be cheaper

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