You are off on a weekend trip! You've booked the flights on a great sale, found some "cheapish" accommodation - in my case it was a relaxed, friendly backpackers - and then you starting thinking of all the other things to account for. Petrol, snacks...

Oops - that's right, a rental car. 

Well, take it from me... Don't look on your plane ticket for a rental! The one day of car rental was more than the cost flight, there and back! 

I have a little trick up my sleeve for this one when travelling in Christchurch or Auckland (New Zealand!). For the past about 7 years, every time we've gone to Auckland, we've ended up booking with NZ Discount Car Rentals. I'm not one to book without looking hard at prices.... so I've looked hard, wide and far... and every single time they've been the cheapest. 

Are they as cheap as they sound? Well, from $19 a day or sometimes less  (these are off peak rates from what I understand), you can get a rental car, which is a pretty awesome deal. Or more importantly, it's about the cheapest you can find. In comparison... Rent-a-Dent lowest is $35 per day. 

This is literally what's on there at the moment 🙂 (They have cheaper off peak rates... AND they give you an upgrade when you come back and use them again).

Are they any good though?.... YES! I seriously would have expected way less than the quality and condition of these for the price. They've been basically all we were wanting - which to be fair wasn't something that was utterly immaculate at this price either - we've prefer to relax and spend our money using fuel to get around the country on a holiday than to use the flashest car!

Insurance is the kicker though. It comes at $14 more per day which is a pretty standard... or low price wherever you go. But, I have a trick for this too!

For instance, using my trick a 3 week holiday in a big campervan, would be $180 for 4 of us (only around $100 if there wasn't a big excess on the campervan though!) - With Britz, it would be $45 per day. (That's $945 if you were wondering....) I know because we actually did this last year!

The downsides? You have to pay the bond or have it held on your credit card then they'll give it back at the end. If you have a crash (etc) and you need to claim, you can claim it back from 1Cover.

The upside? $14-45 per day saved. I personally paid $43 for my 5 day holiday - and that added insurance for the car, flights, travel etc! 🙂

So what is the trick? Well, you go to 1Cover and book your insurance through them! Easy and quick! (And to clarify, I do get a $20 voucher if you do this, but it’s genuinely cheaper and I use it myself! - I put these vouchers towards giving our moderators in Cheaper Living a wee boost for all the hard work they do!)

*Disclaimer*: Thanks so much NZ Discount Car Rental for helping us out by sponsoring the car rental whilst me and Isaac were in Auckland! It was incredible to be able to go to the NZ Social Media Awards for our group, it makes things like this so much easier... and well, we would've used you anyway 😉