April Airport Rates Up $9.71 from Year Ago
April rate quotes for the six cities continued to be strong, according to Rate-Highway's monthly rate survey. In April, the rates were up $9.71 from a year ago.

Rate data provided by Rate-Highway, a leading 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. 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.
With the help of Jim Tennant of The Tennant Group and Michael Meyer of Rate-Highway, Inc., we are conducting rate surveys on a weekly basis and providing analysis and comments where appropriate. We publish this monthly recap in our electronic edition and more comprehensive looks in the print editions.

April rate quotes for the six cities continued to be strong, up $9.71 from a year ago.
Boston and Houston continued to show strong numbers. And while down over $20 from last month, Miami was still up $11.29 over last year.
On the other hand, Los Angeles continues to lag behind the other five cities with a 12-month average of $37.19 — $9.38 lower than Seattle, the next lowest city.
After an apparent slowdown in February and unusual weekly swings — probably caused by the timing of Easter in March 2013 — the positive April showing is cause for optimism when it comes to rates this summer.

Rate data provided by Rate-Highway, a leading 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. 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.
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