Since I got so much help from Jeremy wanted to share this little hack for the community. It's not really points based but I have saved hundreds of dollars a year on car rentals.
1.) Have to have Costco membership. If you rent a car for a vacation at least once a year for even a few days you can pay for this membership
2.) Book a car rental through costco travel portal 1-2 months ahead of time if possible
3.) Check every week, mid-week for lower rates
4.) Costco allows you to cancel at any point, so you just cancel the other and rebook
I know this doesn't sound that fancy but it's been incredible to me the savings I reaped. When you book with costco they never hold you r card. In fact I have literally not cancelled and the reservation just goes into the either cuz I didn't pick it up.
Just an example...I have an upcoming rental for 2 weeks. I booked a week ago and was able to get prices for $380 for two weeks. I checked back in a couple days and it had already dropped...just 10 bucks so I booked it again, cancelled the old one. Now I look at the rates and they are still far out, but are at $800.
5.) When you get closer to the actual day of the trip, check again. A lot of times the rentals won't sell so the rates just keep dropping. Again I did this on a trip to hawaii...started out with a rental cost of around $800, got it down to 500, then later 300-400.
