The hum started on a Tuesday in May, somewhere between Maxton and Laurinburg, a low growl from the front right that got louder when I took the curve by the church. Wes listened to it for about four seconds in the carport that evening and said, "Bearing." By Wednesday the shop had confirmed it: a front wheel bearing, $486, and the part wouldn't be in until the following Monday.
We were supposed to leave Friday for Beaufort, South Carolina, and Hunting Island. So we rented a compact car in Fayetteville for three days, $164 out the door, and drove it 560 miles round trip.
That got me wondering. Was the rental actually more expensive than taking our own 2017 CR-V would have been? Not counting the repair, which we had to pay either way. Just the trip.
What the rental cost
The rental itself, three days with taxes and fees, was $164. The little car got about 36 miles per gallon on the highway, so 560 miles took 15.6 gallons, and at $3.29 that came to $51. Then there was the extra driving to Fayetteville and back to pick it up and drop it off: about 100 miles in our own car over two runs, roughly $11 in gas.
That's $226 to move the two of us 560 miles, or about 40 cents a mile.
Before I picked it up, I called the credit card company we used and talked to our own insurance agent about what would cover the car if something happened. I'm not going to tell anybody what to buy, because every policy and card is different, but after both calls I felt OK declining the collision waiver at the counter. The gap I found was loss-of-use and administrative fees, which the rental company can charge for the days a damaged car sits in the shop. Not everything covers those. Check your own policy before you're standing at the counter.
What our own car would have cost
This is harder, because our own car's costs don't come with a receipt at the end of the trip. Here's how I figured it, using what we actually spend on the CR-V:
- Gas: at 31 miles per gallon, 560 miles is 18 gallons, $59 at $3.29
- Tires: our four tires cost $684 last October. If they last about 50,000 miles, that's about 1.4 cents a mile, so $8
- Oil: Wes does it himself for $38 every 5,000 miles, less than a penny a mile, so $4
- Other wear: brakes, plugs, the CVT fluid change in March and the general repairs that come with 125,000 miles. I estimated 4 cents a mile from our receipts over the last year, so $22
Total: about $93, or about 17 cents a mile.
I didn't include insurance or the value of the car going down a little with every mile. We pay insurance whether we drive to Beaufort or not, and at this age the CR-V loses value mostly from time, not from one weekend. If you want to count those, the number would be higher, but probably not 40 cents.
Our own car, by about $133 for this trip. Not even close.
The rental makes the most sense for short trips with a bad car, or long trips in a car that's going to cost you a lot per mile. A rental's daily price doesn't change much whether you drive 100 miles or 600. So the longer the drive, the closer the two get per mile. If we'd driven 1,200 miles in those three days, the rental would have been about 25 cents a mile instead of 40.
Gas mileage helped the rental. That compact got about five more miles per gallon than the CR-V, which saved us about $8. That's the only line where it won.
What we're doing now
The real lesson was the bearing, not the rental. A $486 surprise in the same week as a trip is the kind of thing that ruins the whole month's budget. The wheel bearing came out of savings, not the trip account, but it made us start a separate car repair fund the week after we got home. We're putting money in it every payday until it reaches $1,000.
The trip itself was wonderful. Hunting Island's beach was quiet on a Saturday morning in May, the lighthouse grounds were green, and Beaufort is one of the prettiest little towns I've seen. The whole trip, rental included, came to $471, more than we like to spend. In our own car, paying only for gas, it would have been about $304. The other $34 of tire and wear cost never shows up on a receipt, which is exactly why I wanted to count it. Add it in and the difference is the $133 I figured above.
The CR-V got its bearing on Monday and has been quiet since. The repair fund is at $300 and climbing, and I sleep better knowing it's there.
