Neff Rental reported total third quarter revenue of $81.4 million, down 4.6 percent year over year from $85.3 million in the third quarter last year. Rental revenue dropped 6.6 percent from $75.1 million to $70.1 million.

Revenue totals for the first nine months of 2007 showed smaller decreases, with total revenue dropping 1.9 percent from $246.8 million to $242.2 million, while rental revenue dropped 2.9 percent from $207.6 million to $201.5 million.

Average time utilization decreased from 66.2 percent in Q306 to 63.9 percent in this year’s quarter, while average dollar utilization dropped from 55 percent to 50.9 percent. The average fleet cost at original equipment increased slightly from $534 million to $539 million.

The Miami-based rental company is taking a conservative asset-management approach focused on maximizing free cash flow and reducing debt as economic conditions in several of its markets have become “unexpectedly more challenging,” the company said. The company is concentrating on reducing its fleet size, aggressively redeploying fleet, focusing on expense control, protecting its core customer base and seeking new customer segments. The company paid down $8 million of debt during the third quarter and anticipates paying down an additional $10 million to $15 million of debt by the end of 2007.

EBITDA dropped from $39.2 million in the third quarter of 2006 to $34 million in the recently concluded third quarter.

Neff Rental is No. 8 on the RER 100.