Autos: Ford Rent-A-Car

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Traveling businessmen and vacationers have been the mainstays of the nation's 75,000-car, $370 million auto-rental business. Lately, rental by the "neighborhood" customer — who needs another car when his own is being repaired or his son comes home from college — has become an important factor.

To tap this market, which has grown from 1% of daily rentals in 1960 to 16% today, Ford Motor Co. last week drove into the rental field.

More than 500 of Ford's 6,500 dealers have signed agreements to lease a minimum of five cars from the company, rent them out. Dealers will set their own rates, which are expected to be somewhat below those of Hertz, Avis and National. A Ford dealer in Michigan has begun to rent Falcons for $5 a day and 8¢ a mile, Fords for $8.50 and 12¢, T-Birds for $9 and 12¢. Perhaps optimistically, Ford Division Chief Lee Iacocca says that the major rental-car companies, some of his biggest customers, should not be disturbed by Ford's invasion. Reason: while Ford dealerships are ideally located for neighborhood trade, there are few in downtown areas and none at airports — locations where car-rental companies do most of their business.