Hello all,
my situation is, my SO works from home. We went from 2 cars down to 1 so we could buy the MY (which we love). Lately, it seems like more and more we have conflicts where I am at work and my SO needs to go somewhere. We’ve used Uber to supplement and it’s worked fine and significantly cheaper than a 2nd car. I had an idea yesterday about buying a M3 to have as a 2nd car but renting it on Turo most of the month and only reserving it for conflicts (even know those can pop out of nowhere). I love in Orlando so I would imagine the demand for rentals is high and a quick look on Turo shows only about 12-15 Tesla’s and the average price is $100/day. Assuming 2 weekends a month it gets rented that’s about the car payment plus insurance. I guess my question is, does anyone have any experience renting on Turo and what are your reviews, suggestions?
Thanks in advance.
At one point I was up to 11 cars all purchased outright without debt (Including Tesla's) on Turo before I went back to work a few years ago. Here's why I no longer do it;
-It's a bit heartbreaking to have somebody trash your car even if there is a robust liberty mutual insurance policy in place. Your time for cleaning up trash, cigarette smoke and vomit (yes vomit) is NEVER compensated. Not to mention your overall loss in faith of humanity you'll undoubtedly experience.
-The cheap cars like a Prius (less than $30 per day) rent 10x more than higher end stuff as these people want the absolute cheapest way to get from point A to B.
-You will never have peace when your car is rented. Last minute changes, middle of the night text messages when they can't figure out how to work something, trip extension request at 4AM when the trip is scheduled to end at 7AM. Then there's the time the guy just decided to not bring the car back and I had to report it stollen and 5 weeks later the Highway patrol found him living in the car. Had to show up for court twice as he was charged with GTA. Then there was the time Turo allowed a woman to rent my Volt with a suspended license and she decided to get a DUI in my car so the car was impounded for 4 days before I received a letter notifying me. Spent all day explaining the situation to law enforcement in an attempt to recover my property.
-Ive had a female renter blow the engine on a car while out of state and had to replace the engine entirely. Ive also had a car completely totaled in an accident and countless amounts of damage to my vehicles, some damage was reported by honest renters but usually it was hidden. One person even used bondo and spray paint to attempt to cover damage to the vehicle.
-The old adage that nobody ever waxes a rental and there usually a reason someone doesnt have a car have proved completely true in my experience. In conclusion, I learned a lot about how to run a small business but it just wasn't worth my hassle. I remember deciding to quit after my P85D came back sometime in the middle of the night on a flatbed because the guy just drove it until the battery died then jumped in an Uber and essentially said "not my problem." Same exact scenario actually happened with one of my Nissan Leafs as well. Even though the Tesla had free supercharging and attempts to route you when the battery become too low this guy just couldn't be bothered. When scenarios like this happen is a huge hassle you have little recourse what so ever as the customer is always right.
-There were of course good renters as well who wouldn't top your fuel tank with water so that you didn't charge them for not bring the car back with less fuel than given, but they just weren't as common or memorable.
