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.

The six-city rate quote monthly averages continued the trend that started last November, in this case up a healthy $15.16 over June 2012. All cities, except Los Angeles, showed double digit dollar increases over last year, and Seattle again had the biggest increase, this time up 62% over a year ago.

The six-city average quote is up almost 35% over last June, which bodes well for the car rental industry, the travel industry and the economy in general. Summer is the strongest season in most markets, but June is never the strongest month of the season, so we believe that rate quotes will continue to be strong to the fall. Whether they will hold through the winter is the question – the test will be in September and October.

We are continuing to collect rate quotes for the 50 largest U.S. airports and will publish the results when we have sufficient history to provide meaningful analysis.