AIRBNB FOR YOUR VEHICLE

New digital platform offers drivers parking spaces at homes and businesses and is opportunity for extra income

RENTING out your driveway, garage or parking bay could earn you up to R17000 a year, and could be the property play you have been looking for to make extra cash.

In the UK this market is known as the “driveway rental market” and was estimated to be worth £3.8 billion (more than R67bn at current exchanges rates) in 2018.

A recently launched local website (basically Airbnb for parking) is offering a platform to earn extra cash by matching frustrated motorists looking for parking with homeowners with parking bays.

RentMyBay, developed by Capetonian Craig Murray, works this way: You let, in return for cash, a parking space you are under-utilising or not using at all to someone looking for guaranteed, secure parking for their vehicle.

“Our aim is to optimise parking spaces, creating more availability, additional revenue streams and less congestion,” says Murray,

The space can be your driveway, off-street parking space, garage or lock-up, or even empty land. It doesn’t matter, as long as it is yours to let and is suitable for parking.

If you are a mini entrepreneur you could go from neighbour to neighbour and ask to help rent their space, and then list them on the site for extra cash “as long as they have the permission of the owner and the owner understands what they are signing up for”, says Murray.

Currently the average rent for a parking bay in Cape Town’s CBD is between R800 and R1215 a month.

Murray says the site has a host who is currently earning R17 300 a year from his parking bay in a CBD building, but the average is R12 000 to R16 000 a year in the CBD, depending on location.

“Generally the closer to businesses the more expensive the bays become.”

He says many customers are drivers looking for a safe, affordable place to leave their car, but there are also boat owners and traders with small commercial vehicles looking for a spot.

At present the service has 80 private bays in the Cape Town CBD, but Murray expects the number to increase this month when the platform is extended to businesses which will be able to let their company bays. Businesses, body corporates and estate agencies which sign up will pay a commission of 6% to 8%.

A parking “host” would not necessarily let their space for long periods, although they could do so. The site provides automated lease renewals. If a lease is not renewed, the parking bay will automatically reappear on the system so a new tenant can be found.

As with Airbnb, hosts can “block” bookings for certain periods, when they would not be at work, for example. The difference? No intrusion inside your house like when you let a room.

RentMyBay can also be used for events. A host near Kenilworth racecourse could let parking in their driveway only on the day of a big race.

IN THE AIR With a shortage of parking in many areas in Cape Town, especially the central business district, a recently launched local website has been designed to offer businesses and homeowners the opportunity to rent out space to frustrated motorists. This means you could earn extra cash from your driveway.

ENTREPRENEUR RentMyBay was developed by Capetonian Craig Murray.

| PICTURE: GEORGIA-DE-LOTZ GOOD PLAN Parking can be a moneyspinner.