Name: English for Real Life: Renting a Car
Uploaded: 2025-07-20T19:27:26.000Z
Duration: 21 min 13 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Hi everybody, welcome to www.engvid.com, I'm Adam.

To-infinitive

In today's video, we're going to talk about renting a car, okay?

And all the things you need to keep in mind before you go to the car rental place.

So, you'll notice here that I wrote rent a car or hire a car.

So, this is North American English, this is British English.

In English, you would hire a car, in Canada, US, you would rent a car, just so you know that.

So, the first thing you're going to have to consider is the type of vehicle you want.

So, actually, I should write this word here, anything that moves, a little bit mixed, anything that moves on wheels is essentially a vehicle, okay?

So, you're going to have to consider the type or the size of the car that you want.

So, generally, they move up in price as you get bigger, a bigger car or a bigger engine.

So, economy, that's the cheapest car you're going to get.

It's also the cheapest on gas, which is a good thing.

If you're thinking about saving money, you might want an economy car.

Now, keep in mind that an economy car will be very small.

A hatchback, there's no trunk, the back door opens.

So, you usually have, like, maybe two doors on the side and the back door opens up, and that's a very small car, and we call that a hatchback.

A sedan has four doors, a coupe has two doors.

So, a coupe is considered more like a sporty car, but they come in all the different sizes, can be sedans or coupe.

So, the compact car is also pretty small, has a small engine, usually four cylinders, and it's also very good on gas, but it's a little bit bigger than the economy.

The standard generally is comfortable for five people, two in the front, three in the back.

It's also generally a four-cylinder, but it has a little bit more power.

It gets more gas into the engine, it can go a little bit faster, a little bit better gas mileage as well, and generally just a little bit more comfortable.

But again, it's getting bigger and bigger.

Then you have either a full-size car or a crossover, and these are generally considered basically family cars, where you can have three people in the back very comfortably.

Here in the standard, you can have three people in the back a little bit tight.

In the full-size, they have a little bit more space in the back.

It could be a six-cylinder, so the engine might be a little bit bigger by now.

A crossover is between a full-size sedan and an SUV.

An SUV, sports utility vehicle, we sometimes call them trucks.

They're bigger, taller, longer, bigger tires, and often they come 4x4 or all-wheel drive, meaning all four tires can move together, which is very good if you're going to a place that has a lot of snow on the roads, like in Canada, for example.

So a crossover is somewhere between a full-size car and an SUV.

Then, you get into the luxury or premium car types.

These are like your BMWs, your Mercedes, your Audis, etc.

So it's a bigger car, a bigger engine, more luxurious, more space inside, maybe leather seats, maybe a sunroof, so more features in the car.

And again, obviously, you're getting the name, the brand name to go with it if that's important to you.

Then, there are people who rent cars not to go on a trip.

Maybe they need to move from one house to another or one apartment to another, and they just need to move a few things, or they're going on a long vacation with all the family and they need more space for all their stuff.

They can get a minivan, which is a very comfortable van, or they can get a cargo van, which is basically for commercial use.

Again, if you're going to move things around or if you're going to buy a new couch and you just need to move it from the store to your house, you would get a cargo van to carry cargo.

So, if you're moving a full apartment or a full house to a new location, you may want a cube truck, which is bigger than a van and it's very square.

So, these are all the different things you can... you can rent, depending on the purpose of your trip.

It's not so common anymore, but you used to have the option, and in some places you might still have the option of a manual or automatic transmission.

So, manual means, like, first, second, third, fourth, fifth, reverse.

You have to move the gears with a clutch and do it manually, or most cars these days are automatic.

Some people like the manuals and they... these days, they're more common in very high-end sports cars, Ferrari, Porsche, Lamborghini, because people want to have that power.

In everyday cars, like family cars, not so common to see manual anymore, at least in North America.

So, one other type of car is a convertible, means no roof.

You can take the roof off and just be under the sun, the wind in your hair, if you like that sort of thing.

If you're trying to impress somebody, who knows?

So, you're going to choose the car or vehicle that you want, and then you may need to add some extras.

If you're coming to Canada in the winter, it is very strongly recommended that the car you rent has winter tires.

If you don't have winter tires, you may get stuck in the snow.

If a... if a heavy snowfall comes and the roads are covered in snow, regular tires, like summer tires or even all-season tires, you're going to spin your wheels.

You can get a GPS, Global Positioning Satellite, or navigation.

You might be... you might see it listed either way, same... same thing.

If you have a young child, you may need a child seat.

Now, it's very important that you do some research.

If you have a young child, the rules are different in different places.

In Canada, I believe it's not about the age of the child, it's about the size of the child.

So, if a child is a certain size, you must have a child seat.

If the police stop you and there's a child in the back seat, and there's no child seat and the child is small, you will get a very, very big penalty.

If the child is in the front seat, you'll get an even bigger penalty.

Children should not sit in the front seat unless they're in a child seat facing backwards.

And then, you may have some options of technology.

If you're renting a minivan for a long trip, let's say you want to go across the country on a road trip, you can rent a video screen and you can put videos for the kids in the back to watch.

You can get an upgraded stereo, you can get a satellite radio, which has no commercials and you can choose the channels you want and the content you want.

So, all kinds of tech things that you can add to the car, but you're going to have to pay more for that.

The first thing you're going to need to decide on before you go to the rental store.

Again, if you're not exactly sure what all of these things mean, the best exercise for you, actually, is just find some rental companies.

Look, car rental in Canada, and you'll see a whole bunch of different companies and they will show you pictures and samples of the cars that they offer for each category, and then you'll have a better understanding of what these words mean.

Next, we're going to talk about some essentials of renting a car.

Okay, so now, we've chosen the car we want to rent, now there are some things that are very important to consider before you go rent a car.

Now, in some places, it's mandatory, like you must purchase insurance on the car.

So, for example, when I rent a car, I don't buy the insurance because I use my credit card, and my credit card company provides insurance on car rental.

If you don't have a credit card that offers insurance, it's very highly recommended that you buy some insurance.

Now, there are different types of insurance.

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English for Real Life: Renting a Car

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