Peer-to-peer renting

Peer-to-peer renting refers to the process of an individual renting an owned good to another individual. It is also referred to as peer rental, or P2P renting. The term is mainly used to describe online enabled rental transactions between individuals.

Individuals have been renting from each other for decades, in particular in the real estate domain. However, with Internet acting as a facilitator, the extent of categories of goods rented between individuals has significantly increased, including household items, computer and electronics, sport and leisure goods, clothing and accessories...

The term "Peer-to-peer renting" is inspired from the computer networking term "Peer-to-peer", which allows cumulative network bandwidth through direct and multiple connectivity between users. With the development of the Internet on one hand and of the Social Networks on the other hand, online tools and services tend to have more and more usability and impact in the actual world. Peer-to-peer lending, Peer to Peer Banking and "Peer-to-peer renting" are three examples of actual transactions between individuals, enabled and empowered by virtual services.

"Peer-to-peer renting" services and Platforms are usually online marketplaces connecting individuals and enabling rental transactions between them. Peer-to-peer marketplaces are an evolution from the traditional Business-to-business marketplaces (also referred as "B2B"), and Business-to-consumer marketplaces (also referred as "B2C"). These latter B2B or B2C marketplaces have been developed, some remaining operating, since 2000. For instance, the European B2C marketplace [http://www.erento.com erento.com] is operational since 2003 and dedicated to the rental business, but does not allow "Peer-to-peer renting"transactions. The online rental marketplace erento launched in 2007 also in the UK [http://www.erento.co.uk erento.co.uk]

"Peer-to-peer renting" services and Platforms started appearing between 2000 and 2001, and were short-lived. Since 2006, various platforms have been launched in all parts of the world, with a dozen services operational as of November 2007.

"Peer-to-peer renting" services and Platforms are often referred to as [http://www.ebay.com Ebay] for rentals, or [http://www.craigslist.org Craigslist] for rentals, as these latter two services are the most famous Consumer-to-consumer marketplaces and classifieds platforms.

The fast development of this market is due to a combination of the following trends:
* Networking infrastructure and high-bandwidth penetration reaching a level allowing Social Networks and Consumer-to-consumer marketplaces,
* Limited storage space in dense urban environment preventing consumers to keep all the goods they occasionally use,
* Increasing environmental concerns of consumers leading towards limitations of waste of resources and overconsumption,
* Evolution of consuming behaviors from owners to users.

ee also

* Peer-to-peer
* Peer-to-peer lending
* Peer to Peer Banking
* Consumer-to-consumer
* Marketplace

External links

* [http://mashable.com/2007/11/06/zilok/ Mashable explains the Peer-to-peer Renting service zilok.com]
* [http://siliconvalley.internet.com/news/article.php/586191 Early player RentAnything.com communication report]
* [http://www.trendwatching.com/trends/transumers.htm TrendWatching article defining Transumers and corresponding consumer behavior evolutions]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxrcFRCx-9A ABC 7 News Video story explaining P2P renting process interviewing Zilok members]