Car Rental

Geoff, you might want to check out the highly recommended AutoEurope website. Many contributors to the forum, myself included, have had success using them.

We have had good luck with both Sixt and Hertz in Europe.

Auto Europe! I’ve used them for years and never had a bad experience.

I just called AutoEurope for a quote on a car rental between Lisbon and Porto. We are deciding whether to drive or take the train. They were very helpful to quote the price of both standard and automatic cars. We have used them for years and always been very satisfied.

Thanks for the tips. We have used the web site autoeurope and booked with Budget and Thrifty and keeping fingers crossed

In general for anywhere in Europe my go to first choice is to use AutoEurope.com but stick with
Europcar, Hertz or Avis from their site ; whichever is cheaper for what I want. Sixt is typically good too but have never seen it cheaper on AutoEurope ; I avoid all others in Europe.

You may find Budget or Thrifty is fine like it is in the US in Portugal or you may not.
In Italy I know those 2 have bad reputations so all of Europe I stay away

When the rates at AutoEurope,com seem high I may check AutoEurope.eu which is sometimes lower as well.
I believe I found that to be the case in Portugal and it seems the same terms? (I don't know for sure)

Directly booking with Hertz and the others may be cheaper if you have a discount code (AAA, Costco, Corporate Rate, etc...) but if you plan on paying for the zero deductible insurance it always is cheaper through AutoEurope and you can add that on the website not only at the counter ; which is a nice benefit and reason they are my first choice.