So as some of you have noticed, it’s a little bit crazy getting a rental car in Maui. There are a variety of options, but all of them seem to be pretty expensive right now. And since I just came over here, I had to rent one myself. So… what’s the scoop?!?
The way I did it was basically just constantly checking Priceline, Costco Travel and Avis, which I have a preferred membership at. Usually Costco is the best option. They’re kind of my go-to place for rental cars anywhere. They have great rates, but they also don’t get the same amount of inventory because of those rates. So I was finding Priceline to be better for Maui right now. They consistently had the lowest rates up until a couple days before my flight. I even checked renting a car from Kahului and dropping it off at Kapalua… see towards the end for more info on that. (btw… I’m not getting paid or affiliated with the above companies, they just have good rates)
And I did find a decent rate at last minute. So if you can hold out until the day before or the day of your arrival, you can often get good rates, or at least they’ll be cheaper than what you might see a week or two weeks out. Also, the day of the week matters. It was easier to get a cheaper car on Monday or Tuesday than Friday. (this goes for any travel expenses, including flights) But I arrived Thursday before Memorial Day weekend and still got a rate of about $100/day (booked it on the plane there).
(You can experiment with all this yourself, just check rental sites for rates for today or tomorrow or a week from now. Do that for about a week to see how things change.)
ALSO, check out Kihei Rent-A-Car. They are awesome. You should definitely try and get a car through them. But when I checked, they were totally booked for quite a while. So, um, I don’t think that’s so much an option, but, uh, it’s definitely worth giving them a call or reaching out to see if they have anything available for the dates that you are on Maui.
If you MUST have a car… it’s never a bad idea to rent something through like Costco or Expedia or something where you can cancel for free. And then constantly check back to see what the current rates are, especially the week before you leave. And check multiple times a day. Check Priceline, Costco, check anywhere that you might have preferred status or be able to get a good deal. I also have AAA, which has a, an agreement with Hertz and that can sometimes have some good rates, but Costco is better usually. Hertz is normally way too expensive.
So I ended up renting through Avis. It was about $50 cheaper than if I had gone through Costco. Costco had Alamo at $1280, and I was able to do a last minute thing on Avis for like $1235 for 10 days. But again, that was totally last minute. I would’ve gone with Costco and Alamo otherwise.
Minivans and SUVs seem impossible to get, so if you need one, expect to pay a lot.
Why is this happening?!?
The car companies got slammed during the pandemic. So they sold off a bunch of cars and now they’re having trouble ramping back up. Travel to Hawaii has exploded, so demand bounced back faster than most people expected. And cars are in short supply, both because of the chip shortage that’s affecting car manufacturers. And the fact that, you know, Maui is an island and it takes a bit of doing to get cars over here.
I’m not expecting this to go on forever. Certainly not $300-$400/day. As they get more cars over the next few months, we’ll see car rental rates dropping to their normal prices, or at least, you know, something more reasonable, like 80-100/day. If you’re coming in August, I would wait until the last minute. I think the rates are going to be much better by then. At least I hope so. Just be checking on a regular basis. Judging from the amount of cars available at the last minute, it feels like there are a lot of cars on island.
Kahului to Kapalua?
Let’s talk about the Kahului to Kapalua thing… sometimes that was the cheapest rate. When renting it and returning it to Kahului was 300 or $400 a day, I was seeing deals for like $60 a day if I dropped off in Kapalua. So I’m guessing some of the rental car companies want to get cars to Kapalua. And so you were getting a better rate for helping them out. That was only one particular weekend, I wasn’t seeing it consistently. Also, in that case, I would have rented the car for four or five days, returned it to Kapalua, and then just taken an Uber back to Kahului when my flight was ready for departure. And that way I’d have a car for a few days, I could do all the stuff I needed to do with the car and then the last few days I would just kind of hang out. Either taxi it around or just stay close to where I was saying. So that’s always an option.
Turo, Car Sharing
There are also sites like Turo and a lot of locals have been trying to rent their cars out on that. I don’t know if I would do that. The quality of the cars on Maui are often not great. People don’t always take care of them and people are definitely taking advantage of this situation. Trying to charge exorbitant rates for cars that are not in good condition. There are also a lot of good cars on Turo, but you want to make sure that the person you’re renting it from has lots of good reviews, and you’re not going to end up renting some sort of rolling wreck. So definitely use some discretion.
So there you have it. That’s the crazy car situation we have here in Maui right now. It’s probably going to get better soon, but for now it’s a little bit nuts.