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Mamacita said:
I <3 CTK
Brooklynian » Forum » The Lounge / Random Stuff »
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Who has it? I'm tired of paying for insurance + gas + maintenance on my 16 year old Honda Accord. I live in Crown Heights near Nostrand. Anyone in that area use it? What are people's general impressions with it?
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I'm just off of Classon (you used to live around the corner?) and I've had a ZipCar account for a few years. In general, I like it, but I'm used to doing the majority of my errands within walking distance. I think that it's well worth it for things like the odd Home Depot run, picking up/dropping off a guest from the airport, etc. For stuff like groceries, I don't think that it makes sense - why "save" money at Fairway when it's going to cost you $40 for the car? For short trips (2-3 days) out of the city, the convenience of pick-up/drop off, and the fact that gas is paid for, often makes it a good deal. Almost all of the ZipCar garages that I've used have been in the area closer to GAP. I would hope that ZipCar users, regardless of location, would keep the cars in halfway decent shape, but who knows?...not that there's anything wrong with that.
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Well for local grocery runs I will just bike. But I shop at BJs once a month, and occasionally my gf has family come in from LGA. So for $50/mo, and not having to deal with street parking or all the expenses it seems worth it over ownership.[
Mamacita said:
I <3 CTK
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Vs. owning a car... there's no effin' way I'm owning a car in BK....not that there's anything wrong with that.
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Zipcar's great for rentals by the hour, even up to a day or so. That said, renting for a weekend can be painful - first, reservations for an entire weekend can be hard to come by at the last minute, you really need to plan ahead. Second, it's pretty darn expensive to rent one for the weekend - last time I looked, renting a Honda Civic from Friday Night -> Sunday Night (2 days) was going to run me close to $300. Don't know what a traditional rental car would cost me tho, and I do have a Zipcar facility a block away. That said, I don't really miss owning a car - between gas, tolls, maintenance & insurance, I was paying $2500/year easily, to drive 5-6,000 miles/year. And that doesn't even count all the time I spent looking for parking spaces, etc. If I remind myself of that expense, $300 weekends aren't as shockingly expensive.
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You can rent a car around here for probably $50 a day. It will be a Yaris or something of that nature but it will be a car. And still, $300 for one weekend is small change in light of the $6000/yr I'm spending now.[
Mamacita said:
I <3 CTK
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If you don't really drive much, Zipcar is sooo much better than owning (I sold my 96 Accord a few years ago and have been fine with Zipcar since). No worrying about parking (esp when it snows!), no finding a gas station, no insanely expensive insurance, no tickets. I'm no longer in your vicinity, so I can't speak to the availability but I don't regret giving up my car. The amount I save (insurance, gas, maintenance) is far more than we spend on Zipcars and taxi's between two of us. And most of the time we take a taxi, we wouldn't have used the car anyway. It's not perfect. Every now and then the reservation before yours runs a little late or they don't leave 1/4 tank of gas but in general I'm happy with it. I use it most for errands. If I want to go to several stores to get hard to carry home things, it's perfect. I can hit some combo of Fairway, HD/Lowes, that liquor store by the Gowanus Pathmark, and pick up some take out that's not walking distance to home in one run.
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I dunno... ZipCar's prices seems like they've gotten pretty crazy over the last year or so. I own a car (paid for, just insurance, gas and maintenace) and, well, 4 weekend Zipcar rentals and I'm basically even! Oh, and I have a car ALL the time. Whenever I want it. No limits. If you're within the city -- seems like a car service is cheaper. Or at least the same price, and somone else drives (and you don't have problems with being "late") I like the concept of Zipcars, but they just don't seem to make sense. I'm not saying buy a car, but if you're looking at ZipCar for weekend getaways etc. Just rent a car -- from a regular car rental place. There's a lot of them.
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Yea if I were to go away for a weekend I would definitely just rent a car. Their rental prices are insane + regular rental places are more flexible time wise. But regular rentals + car services would be more for just a trip out to Middle Village (for BJs), plus with Zipcar I think you can roll over unused time; so maybe in a while I'd have enough time to go away for a weekend w/o paying extra.[
Mamacita said:
I <3 CTK
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I sold my car in 1998. My wife had a company car until two years ago, so now we use ZipCar about once a month. We live in Crown Heights, so it's a bit of a trek to get to the closest garage. It's worth it to us to make a trip to shopping hell - Fairway, Lowe's and Costco - about once a month because of the lousy food shopping in our neighborhood. The only negatives are occasional dirty cars and sometimes they're not gassed up, but other than that it's great. Their long term rates are pretty nuts. Anything longer than a day and I'd go with one of the regular car rental places.Take the u out of neighbour.
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I don't have them (I still own a car) but have thought about it. The only thing that keeps me from selling my car is the fact that I go upstate a lot and I need a car when I'm up there. I've looked at prices and as some people mentioned above, Zipcar is NOT for weekend use. It's incredibly expensive to rent a car for two full days. You'll pay half that if you just rent a car from a regular car rental place. It is cheaper if you just need a car occasionally for errands and stuff like that. Definitely cheaper than owning a car but if you need a car for out of town trips mainly on weekends you're probably better off without it and going with a regular rental.
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RobNYC » I don't have them (I still own a car) but have thought about it. The only thing that keeps me from selling my car is the fact that I go upstate a lot and I need a car when I'm up there. I've looked at prices and as some people mentioned above, Zipcar is NOT for weekend use. It's incredibly expensive to rent a car for two full days. You'll pay half that if you just rent a car from a regular car rental place. It is cheaper if you just need a car occasionally for errands and stuff like that. Definitely cheaper than owning a car but if you need a car for out of town trips mainly on weekends you're probably better off without it and going with a regular rental.
I belonged to Zipcar for a year and didn't take out a car a single time. For an extended trip, you're better off with a regular rental. For a short errand, it's easier, often cheaper, and more spontaneous (no need for planning a reservation ahead, especially on a weekend) to take a cab. It only really makes sense to me for medium duration half-day type of excursions. The trip to Jersey or Queens, for example. Otherwise, Zipcar's role seems somewhat limited. -
For what I need it for, its great...I need to drive out to Connecticut 2-3 times a month for work for the entire day, and the zipcar garage is about 20 feet from my front door (Makes that 6:00am departure easier)...I'd be paying $15 of the $92/day for just gas given the distance I usually drive, and that doesn't count wear and tear on the car (Which is probably another $20-$30 easy) plus insurance, and parking at that garage is probably another $10 per day... If I was going out there 4-8 times a month though, the economics would be a lot less less compelling...
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I just read a pretty good article- things every Zipster needs to know: THE DARK SIDE OF ZIPCAR https://www.blurpr.com/blog/?p=101"...you can choose the rain....but I choose the sun..." - N. Costa
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