Hello If I were to spend six months in France and taking trips to different places by car, what would you suggest I do in order to have a good car during these 6 months? I think a conventional rental car company is out of question, - buy used and try to sell it at the end of the trip? - find someone with a spare car willing to rent it to me at a much lower cost compared to Car Rental firms - Lease one and then "dropp" the car and the payments....if not illegal -? any ideas or suggestions are appreciated. Thanks.
The main problem for all these short-term non-resident ownerships (and taking the car on an extended vacation) is insurance Most major car hire companies will hve short-term lease / long-term hire divisions to help
Quick google found this which suggested from about USD 4000 for six months https://www.autoeurope.com/peugeot-open-europe-lease/
I once rented a Renault Megane Coupe Turbo Diesel for 94 days for just 900 or so euros. It was through autoeurope.com. The other well know choice is Renault Eurodrive short-term lease. http://www.renaultusa.com/
Buy a LHD car in UK ( there's tons for sale) ( registering a car in UK is extremely simple) Pay the road tax and add insurance ( a company called admiral, will insure US license drivers in the UK and the insurance also covers you in europe) Once you've bought the car in the UK, drive over to Dover, take the ferry to France for under a couple hundred quid and you're good to go. I would work out an arrangement to sell the car back to the dealer you bought from after 6 months, you'll obviously take a hit, but it'll be way less than the cost of a rental and you'll get to drive some much cooler cars. ( one example I bought a nice diesel mercedes for under 10k, drove it for 4 months and sold it for more than I bought it for, currently am driving a 2010 Range Rover and I'll lose less than 5k on it) This idea isn't conventional, but it's what I do about twice a year.