Payless Car Rental franchise: cost, fees & unit track record
Opening a Payless Car Rental franchise takes $605,500 – $1,568,400 all-in, per its franchise disclosure filings (data as of 2026-05). The initial franchise fee is $25,000 – $30,000. Ongoing, franchisees pay a royalty of 8% on sales. Anything the filings do not state is marked "Not disclosed" below — never estimated.
Payless Car Rental franchise costs and fees
| Verification mark | Cost item | Low | High | Range |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Initial franchise feeOne-time, paid to the franchisor at signing | $25,000 | $30,000 | $25,000 to $30,000 | |
| Initial investment (all-in)FDD Item 7-derived range: build-out, equipment, opening costs | $605,500 | $1,568,400 | $605,500 to $1,568,400 | |
| Net worth requiredFranchisor's stated qualification minimum | Not disclosed1 | Not disclosed1 | ||
| Liquid cash requiredFranchisor's stated qualification minimum | Not disclosed1 | Not disclosed1 | ||
| Cash to open (all-in range) | $605,500 | $1,568,400 | $605,500 to $1,568,400 | |
- 1 "Not disclosed" means Payless Car Rental's filings do not state this figure. We publish the gap instead of estimating it.
| RoyaltyOngoing, % of sales | 8% |
|---|---|
| Ad fundOngoing, % of sales | Not disclosed |
| Initial termLength of the first franchise agreement | 5 years |
See the full Payless Car Rental cost breakdown — what's in that number and what isn't
How Payless Car Rental's cost compares
A dollar figure means more with a yardstick. Here is where Payless Car Rental's disclosed cost sits against the Auto & Travel category:
- Minimum startup cost of $605,500 — about 3.4× the Auto & Travel median of $177,500.
- Initial franchise fee of $25,000 — about 26% below the Auto & Travel median of $33,740.
Category medians are computed from the Auto & Travel brands in our data that disclosed each figure — a benchmark for scale, not a quality judgment. See all Auto & Travel franchises
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How Payless Car Rental's units have held up
Openings and closures from FDD Item 20-style unit history, 2012–2022: began the window at 21 units; 37 units opened, 16 closed, ending at 24 units. (partial records: 2018 is not in the source data — totals span the reported years only.)
What about earnings?
We don't publish per-brand earnings figures — for Payless Car Rental or anyone else. The only primary source is Item 19 of the brand's own franchise disclosure document (FDD), and no law requires a franchisor to publish one, so the "average owner income" numbers circulating elsewhere are usually unsourced or survivorship-biased. Ask Payless Car Rental for its current FDD and read Item 19 yourself — and if there is no Item 19, that silence is information too.
What this data can't tell you
Everything on this page comes from disclosure filings — fees, ranges, and unit counts. Four questions that matter just as much are not in any filing we can source, so we say so instead of guessing:
- The hours and the labor
- No dataset field says whether Payless Car Rental is a manage-from-a-laptop business or a 60-hour week in disguise. Item 15 of the FDD states whether you're obligated to run the business personally, and Item 11 lists what the franchisor actually does for you — then ask current owners what their week looks like (validation calls), not the sales team.
- How hands-on the ownership really is
- "Semi-absentee" is a pitch, not a filing field. Treat any hands-off claim as unverified until it's consistent with Item 15 and with what multiple current franchisees tell you — what absentee ownership actually means.
- Your territory — whether it's protected, and whether it's open
- Two territory questions sit outside our data. Whether Payless Car Rental grants a protected or exclusive area is set in Item 12 of the FDD and varies brand to brand — some grant none, and the carve-outs (online sales, national accounts) matter as much as the map. And filing data can't say what's open in your market this month; only Payless Car Rental can confirm current availability. Ask both before you inquire, and get the answer in writing.
- What owners earn
- Covered honestly above: our dataset has no earnings fields, the only primary source is the brand's own Item 19, and here is how to read that evidence.
About the Payless Car Rental franchise
Payless Car Rental is an auto & travel franchisor with 24 units at the end of 2022 (FDD Item 20-style unit history). Between 2012 and 2022, it began the window at 21 units; its filings record 37 unit openings and 16 closures, ending at 24 units (partial records: 2018 is not in the source data — totals span the reported years only). Its parent company is Payless Car Rental System, Inc..
No franchise-related lawsuits reported in the disclosure data we hold (FDD Item 3, as of 2026-05) — an absence in our sources, not a guarantee; confirm against the brand's current FDD.
From the franchisor's materials
A Payless Franchise is a business of renting automobiles, without drivers, to the general public, for periods of 180 days or less under the Payless Trademarks.
Payless Car Rental franchise: quick answers
- How much does a Payless Car Rental franchise cost?
- $605,500 – $1,568,400 all-in to open, per Payless Car Rental's franchise disclosure filings (data as of 2026-05).
- How many Payless Car Rental units are there?
- 24 units at the end of 2022 (FDD Item 20-style unit history).
- How have Payless Car Rental's units held up?
- 86.2% of units at risk between 2020 and 2022 did not close, per our metric recomputed from FDD Item 20-style unit history (methodology published on our verification page).