How to rent a car in Germany - being 18 and male

Yes, most major rental agencies like Sixt, Europcar, Avis, Hertz do rent to people from age 18 (legal driving age in Germany). Some of them (but not all) do charge for an extra under-25 insurance. If you rent via a US broker chances are they do charge for being under 25 anyway. My recommendation: Try www.sixt.de. Keep in mind: Diesel engines are as fast as regular gas ones but get a much better milage. A gallon of Diesel is around $5.30 in Germany at the moment, regular is around $6.10 per gallon. If you book directly with the German rental car provider (Sixt is market leader plus you almost always end up driving a BMW, Mercedes, Audi or VW) there is no surcharge for automatic over stick.

Thanks, Andreas! This sounds easier than I thought. My brother always rents with Sixt (he's one of the many Germans who doesn't own a car and doesn't want to) and is very happy with their service.

The autobahn is actually really annoying to drive on. Most are just 2 lanes (each way); the right lane is slow and full of semi-trucks, but the left lane is passing only--you don't cruise in it. So you end up behind semis in the right lane, changing to the left to pass them, then having to move back right to avoid the Audi that is coming up behind you at 120 mph.

...and there ARE speed limits, you know.

I DO know. And I told him already to think carefully about when and where to drive. First of all, try to find out if there's a construction zone on the stretch you're planning to drive. Of course, it doesn't make any sense to drive through the Ruhr during rush hour - you'll be lucky to move at all. And rush hour in the Ruhr is pretty much 18 hours of the day, the other 6 hours have night speed limits. Forget about any of the "Ballungsraeume" such as Berlin, Frankfurt, Koeln/Ruhr, Munich .... those are the areas where you find speed limits almost everywhere. And you'd feel lucky if you could actually reach the speed limit.

But there're still about 40% of the Autbahn net with no speed limit at all. If you plan for a Sunday when there're very few trucks around because of the "Sonntagsfahrverbot" you may get lucky. Pick a stretch through some of the rural areas and you can play with the gas pedal. A31 and A43 (the northern part of it) are my home stretches and I do 160-180 km/h quite safely there most of the time. I think I've never done more than 200 km/h mainly because I've never driven a car in Germany that would have been able to.

Is it annoying to drive on the Autobahn? I find it actually more stressful to drive in cities. Autobahn signage is very good so you have time to adjust for lane changes, exits etc. You need to know the rules and adhere to them and most Germans actually do. Passing on the right is verboten, extremely dangerous, will cost you a hefty fine and maybe even your licence. The biggest adjustment for Northamerican drivers is probably understanding how to drive with trucks on the road that aren't allowed to go over 90km/h and to plan passing them carefully allowing for more or less mediocre acceleration with your rental car.

But yes, you're much more likely to move at a crawl of 60 km/h rather than speed at 160 km/h.

Not a good post for my 17 soon to be 18 year old son who is just chomping at the bit to drive on the Autobahn! He said...Yeeeeeeesss with a big smile!

There is a great 4 to 6 lane freeway from Frankfurt airport down to Darmstadt with no speed limit. And A3 from FRA airport up to Cologne is 95% speed-limit free... and that's about a 90 minutes high-speed bullet ride ;-)... Most freeways around Munich and in Bavaria are old, 2-lanes only and come with speed-limit or with a de facto speed limit due to all the trucks Mon thru Sat. Another great speed limit free ride is from Nuremberg to Dresden or Berlin or A45 from the Frankfurt area to Dortmund.

My experience with the autobahn in Bavaria was traffic as bad as Seattle, or LA. FYI. lol.

does anyone have an estimate for what it costs to rent a car just for one day. i cant find this info anywhere

What kind/size car? Jetta-size including insurance, taxes, fees from around €60 to €99 per day depending on day, season, rental provider... Sixt e.g. consider a full weekend from Friday noon until Monday 9am as 1 1/2 days which makes it quite affordable...

We drove from Siegerland (between Koln and Frankfurt) to Austria on the autobahns on a Sunday in mid September, and while there were stretches that had less traffic and few trucks, our average speed was still 98 kph. There are stretches where you can go 140 kph or more, but they weren't as many as you'd think. It seems that between construction, maintenance and congestion the long stretches where you can go as fast as you like are pretty limited. As other responders have noted, there are speed limits posted. When you pass vehicles you need to be VERY careful as those Mercedes, BMW's, etc who are going 200+ kph come up behind you very quickly.

I have read lately that you now need an international drivers license to rent a car in Germany. Might be good to check this out before he leaves. You can get one through AAA.

Judy