In September's Car Rental Rate Analysis, Boston and Chicago Rates Up Over 2011

In the six-city car rental rate analysis by The Tennant Group and Rate-Highway, four of the cities were down compared to 2011, while Boston and Chicago were up. Chicago's rates showed the most strength.

by Staff

October 2, 2012

In September's Car Rental Rate Analysis, Boston and Chicago Rates Up Over 2011 — Rate data provided by Rate-Highway, a provider of revenue management services for the auto rental industry. Rates are an average of aggregator/OTA rates for all vendors present in the markets listed on the date of the survey.

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With the help of Michael Meyer of Rate-Highway Inc. and Jim Tennant of The Tennant Group, Auto Rental News publishes monthly auto rental rate surveys for six major airports in the cities of Boston, Miami, Chicago, Houston, Seattle and Los Angeles. The rates are based on weekly surveys.

Analysis and commentary provided by Jim Tennant of The Tennant Group. This survey is dated Oct. 2. (Click on the graph below for a larger view.)

Rate data provided by Rate-Highway, a provider of revenue management services for the auto rental industry. Rates are an average of aggregator/OTA rates for all vendors present in the markets listed on the date of the survey.

Rate quotes have now been collected weekly since May 2011, giving five months of year-to-year comparisons.

Rates have been lower every month in 2012 compared to 2011 in the data available, but the gap has narrowed considerably in the last two months from the large differences seen in June and July. September 2012 was just $2.79 lower than last year — a considerable improvement from the $12.25 drop seen in June.

Looking at the year-to-year results in individual cities, Boston and Chicago were up in September, while Seattle, Miami, Los Angeles and Houston were all down and in the sequence named.

In absolute terms, Chicago’s more than $60/day shows considerable strength, and Houston, Boston and Seattle in the mid- to high-$30s are about where one would expect. Miami reflects the low shoulder season period, while Los Angeles is surprisingly low at under $30.

ICAR Average Rate Quotes - Monthly Averages in 2011
	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep
BOS	35.60	62.15	80.80	29.79	38.11
MIA	28.19	56.92	65.51	33.44	31.52
ORD	45.01	59.71	60.46	35.10	56.22
HOU	34.35	45.17	41.91	40.40	49.45
SEA	46.54	60.67	74.80	58.86	37.70
LAX	38.56	51.30	44.33	32.63	34.31
6 City Avg.	38.04	55.99	61.30	38.37	41.22

ICAR Average Rate Quotes - Monthly Averages in 2012
	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep
BOS	30.47	53.51	64.05	29.58	39.25
MIA	16.04	31.34	41.24	21.46	25.50
ORD	60.23	59.81	57.60	58.06	62.46
HOU	52.69	40.42	36.89	33.86	39.99
SEA	30.37	40.33	51.55	36.26	35.08
LAX	27.12	36.99	46.23	24.76	28.26
6 City Avg.	36.16	43.73	49.59	34.00	38.42

2012 vs. 2011
	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep
BOS	(5.12)	(8.65)	(16.74)	(0.21)	1.14
MIA	(12.15)	(25.58)	(24.27)	(11.98)	(6.02)
ORD	15.22	0.11	(2.86)	22.96	6.24
HOU	18.34	(4.75)	(5.01)	(6.54)	(9.46)
SEA	(16.17)	(20.34)	(23.25)	(22.59)	(2.61)
LAX	(11.44)	(14.32)	1.90	(7.87)	(6.05)
6 City Avg.	(1.89)	(12.25)	(11.71)	(4.37)	(2.79)

These tables and graph show the average of all base rate quotes per day for an ICAR at the six airports shown for arrivals 15 to 21 days ahead of the date of the survey, for two- and seven-day rentals. If the arrival date is a Friday or Saturday, the two-day rate will be a weekend rate, otherwise it will be a regular rate.

See the car rental rate report for August here.

Topics:Tennant Group Rental Rates 6-City Survey Airport Rentals Rate-Highway Rental Operations