We’re used to thinking of certain big cities as having huge car rental fees tacked on, especially if you pick up the car at the airport (cough, Boston). But this fall, a city we don’t necessarily associate with high prices has the highest car rental fees in the nation: Little Rock, Arkansas. A survey by Cheapcarrental.com looked at prices at 100 different airports for September through November of this year. The average daily rate for the cheapest car at Little Rock’s Bill and Hillary Clinton National Airport was $95, a price that has risen about 20 percent compared with last fall’s prices. Across the other airports, rates have risen just 0.5 percent since last autumn.
The second most expensive city to pick up a car rental for leaf-peeping is Charleston, South Carolina, at $91 per day for the most inexpensive car, while the third is Madison, Wisconsin, at $87 per day.
Conversely, the city with the most affordable car rentals is Raleigh, North Carolina, where you’ll only have to fork out $41 to go tooling along the Blue Ridge Parkway a few hours away.
For this survey, only rental companies located directly at a destination's airport or at the airport's rental car center were considered.
The 10 most expensive cities for car rentals this fall:
1. Little Rock: $95
2. Charleston: $91
3. Madison: $87
4. Reno: $86
4. St. Petersburg: $86
6. Boise: $85
7. Palm Springs: $83
8. Colorado Springs: $82
8. San Francisco: $82
10. Los Angeles: $80