Hi everyone. I'm a newbie on the site and am personally extremely interested in the caravanning lifestyle. My husband and I would love to join the 'grey nomads' when we retire but hopefully get out and enjoy this beautiful country of ours in the meantime.
I am a member of a new innovation initiative at RACQ that is tasked with investigating new ways to engage and provide additional value to our members. One such idea (and one that I am incredibly passionate about) is to create a platform that facilitates peer-to-peer rentals of idle assets, such as caravans, to try and support the RV and tourism industry in Qld and Australia as a whole.
I do know there are other platforms available that offer a similar service but from what I can see, they're fairly small in their nature and we'd (RACQ) like to make a more effective, efficient and easy to use platform that best serves our members.
Of course no platform, irrespective how good the offering is, will succeed without owners being on board and offering their van for rent.
This leads to my question: would you, as caravan owners, be willing to offer your van for rent by other members? Why/why not?
Any information you can provide is greatly appreciated and thank you all, in advance, for your assistance.
-- Edited by ShariTiley on Thursday 10th of December 2015 11:48:06 AM
Even though our caravan is not used much due to the constraints of still working, I cannot see how we could be persauded to rent the van out to strangers.
We keep a minimum of personal effects in the van as well as the things I like to have on board which may or may not be usefull to others which I would not want to put in and out of the van all the time.
Another reason it is a no would be that it may not be there when we want to use it.
Perhaps if the caravan was old and knocked around we would not think as we do but then who would want to rent it?
Many reasons, top of which is that our caravan is too important to us to let strangers use it. Even with good insurance, there is a wear and tear factor, and just the issue of strangers being in what is to us a very personal space. Like previous posters we keep our personal stuff in the van at all times, so that when we can get away (we are still working) as quickly as possible, only needing to pack clothes and food.
I like to have my van ready to go with little notice. I always have dry food etc. & a couple of changes of clothes in it. I don't know how many people would fit into my jocks.
Hi Shari
Obviously we are people who consider our vans as part of our personal space and would feel very uncomfortable having strangers living in our personal space, the other concern would be that a lot of us would have difficulty replacing our vans if badly knocked about and bear in mind they are fairly easily damaged even when being carefull finally the increased cost in insurance to be able to hire the van would be substantial, so sorry but not for me
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Re: insurance. What if you were automatically covered through your insurance should anything go wrong/damage inflicted to your caravan. Would that change your stance aussietraveller?
This is fantastic feedback. Thank you to everyone who has (so far) responding. Please keep them coming (good, bad, anything in between).
RACQ? To my suspicious mind this is a strange way for a Quality motoring orginisation to do market research. One would have thought that the RACQ would have obtained an endorsement from the web management first. Without proper endorsement I would be wary of any involvement. ( Not that I am interested anyhow)
Mike: I am in a small team within RACQ working on new methods to engage with our members. Apologies if I offended you - I thought it was a quick and easy way to verify whether we proceed with putting this idea forth to management. I have sent through notification through to The Grey Nomads as well.
Thank you for your input.
-- Edited by ShariTiley on Thursday 10th of December 2015 03:55:47 PM
Our caravan is our holiday home on wheels. Allowing someone else to use our an is not for us. Besides, the Missus wouldn't like some strange man messing around in her undies drawer.
Who was the idiot that thought up the idea?
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I also would not let someone use our caravan ,But when i seen it was RACQ coming up with the idea my first thought was insurance and were they looking at making more money on our insurance .
Ok no need to get nasty. It's not certain of going ahead, we are just testing the market at this stage. There are a couple of players already in the P2P Caravan lending market and we are seeing if it's a viable concept to pursue. I appreciate your time and effort in responding. Keep the feedback coming through
Actually not such a bad thing for some I reckon... In our case we are travelling in a motorhome while our caravan sits idle in storage (while we decide which is best). If there was a guarantee of compensation for ANY damage I may be convinced. Would have to be some incentive though, either monetary or in the form of insurance discount perhaps. Just saying you shouldn't reject the idea outright even though it isn't attractive for all.
We have a Mercedes Sprinter Campervan & would not rent that to anyone.
With caravan rental who would be responsible for ensuring that the proposed tow vehicle is legal to tow your van & then have weigh bridge certification that whole rig is within its limits.
What if it is involved in an accident & the renters have overloaded it- I presume most insurance would not pay out & then you would have a wrecked van & have to legally try & persue the renters-best of luck with that option.
Most rented van offers I have seen here in Tassie are for on site use & are towed to site by the owner not for the renter to tow wherever they chose.
Thanks everyone, but I think I'll close this now. The OP did write to me, however, it was several hours after she had already posted this string. I would have asked a few more questions before this would have been allowed.