Car Rental for a month in NJ (Jersey City: rental car, coupons)

[cormalado]

Hi Folks,

I live in Jersey City and I am looking for car rental for a month.

I looked first for companies like Budget, Alamo, Dollor, AVIS etc.. But all are coming close to $1500 and above.

But the price they told was : Including full insurance.

Is there anyway I can reduce this price money by taking an auto insurance on a rental car by applying through insurance companies like geico,statefarm etc.

First of all, can I even apply for car insurance with insurance companies for a rental car ?

Other than this, I researched for private car rentals and came up with companies as mentioned below:
http://www.rentexpressnj.com/contact.htm

http://www.ourhometownsupercoupons.com/cartownautorentalsandsaleslindennj07036.html

http://carpalacerental.com/contact.htm

All of these do provide car rentals at a much cheaper price. But they only have liability insurance (probably less than $80/$100 for a month).
The companies told me to check with my credit card company (which for my case if BofA).
I am yet to contact them, but as far as I know credit card covers for accident insurance only.

If I am looking for a full insurance as well as a much cheaper rental car, which is my best option.
Any suggestions is deeply appreciated.

Thanks.

Cheers

[phl76]

Not sure how often you need the car and how far you will need to drive, but maybe a zipcar work out to be cheaper. Insurance is included in the price of membership and rental.

Rates & Plans, car sharing instead of car rental and owning a car – Zipcar

[cormalado]

I tried applying for zipcar, but they wont give me membership since I do not have driving history for previous one year. Some crazy rule.

I will be driving for 2 hours per day in weekday and more than 8/10 hours in weekend.

I wanted more information on how to apply for insurance with geico/statefarm/companies like that.
Should it be applied only for personal vehicle ? Can it not be included for rental vehicle ?
I do not have a personal vehicle of my own yet. Will buy one soon.

But until then, I want to rent a car for 1 month.

[Ms_Christina]

I don't think you can buy insurance just for a rental car. It would be cheaper to buy a $500 junker and drive that until you can afford a nicer car or hope it holds together for a year and then get zipcar.

[NJGOAT]

There is no way to buy a traditional auto insurance policy unless you have a car. You cannot buy one to cover a rental car, though if you have it some of them do offer a certain level of protection if you do rent a car. In most cases, the coverage through your credit card company if it is offered is all you really need, but those coverages vary widely in terms of how much protection you have. Also, auto insurance and credit card coverage is often lessened in the event of a "long term rental" which they all have a different definition of.

Given your situation I think you basically have two options:

1. Carefully research the insurance offerings from the rental car companies and only purchase the level of coverage you actually need. You do need to have insurance and given your unique situation this is pretty much the only way you are going to get it.

2. Buy the cheapest you can find and take out a liability policy on it and drive it for the month or so until you buy a different car. This option carries the risk of the car being unreliable or needing some repairs, but should cost less then the rental car plus insurance coverage through the rental company.

[HalfFull]

Have you checked with Rent-a-Wreck? I thought they had deals for longer term rentals.