Well, to the rental company, that's not really a cross-country trip (as long as you make sure you have unlimited miles and no restrictions on how many states you can drive the car in; I've not seen the latter restrictions at Avis that I can remember, but I've seen them somewhere, probably Enterprise).

So your price quesiton is really about a 2-month rental, not a cross-country trip, right?

So what you seem to be getting is simply a $250ish weekly rate. Although that's not great, it's not necessarily that bad, depending on where the rental orgiinates. It's just that most people don't stretch it out to 2 months.

I think planned multi-month rentals at conventional car companies are rather rare. They don't tend to have monthly rates that I'm aware of (except again maybe Enterprise, since they do a lot of rent-while-your-car-is-repaired). And in fact htere tend to be penalties for multi-month rentals, like inability to earn points/miles/etc.

The suggestions would be similar to other home-base rental suggestions, starting with have you compared prices with the rental starting at all possible local airport locations? (Rentals tend to be cheaper at airports, even if it may be more convenient to use a non-airport location near you. And some airports are more competitive than others. For a two month rental, it could pay off to start off somewhere where you have to pay a bit to get there and back, but still save money net.)