For many, it was a usual thing to book a room on Booking.com or Airbnb, bet we usually look for cars in local car rental companies of the same country. Of course, major car rental companies maintain their status because of their size, but they don’t try to compete with locals in terms of price. Have you ever thought why in our modern world of technologies we still don’t have offers like room + car in one? Of course, when you book a room or airline tickets, car rental offers come in pushy, but this is just co-booking or upsales.

As a rule, new business ideas emerge not only through meditation but simply through listening to clients. As I like to say “what women want”. Recently I got an email from the apartment rental manager of a city in Germany about the car sharing option. According to him, many of his clients rent apartments, and when they need a car, they have no alternative other than simply renting it for a day or two in a traditional way. And then I remembered my trips, and the headaches that follow you during each of them.

Of course, when you need a car for one day, for travelling a hundred or a couple of hundred of kilometres to another city, traditional rental is your solution, but you have also simple daily needs such as shopping when the shop is not so close to your home; or simply taking a short ride somewhere. I remember spending one month in Spain last year; I was forced to rent a car for a whole month because I had to go shopping every day, but for the rest of the day the car was peacefully parked at the door and wasting my money, because traditional car hire companies do not want you to pay only when you are driving the car.

So, the German rationality offered a solution. It is not a very big investment for an apartment owner to leave several cars for his tenants in the garage, to use as needed. Thanks for the car sharing technologies and solutions, there is no headache and no need for administration. The tenant will unlock the car with his smart phone and use as much as he needs. The landlord will set the price per minute or per kilometre, and this will be not only an additional service for the tenant, but also extra income for the landlord.

Even traditional hotels are discovering it as an extra service for their clients. For example, Oasis Smart tells its clients, “I’ll even throw in a complimentary Smart Car for your stay – how clever is that?” 

ReachNow Fleet Solutions, with the Albanese Organization at The Solaire, the developer’s high-rise residential tower at 20 River Terrace in Battery Park City, New York just launched apartment+BMW service.

And today I have a day when drinking water is no longer available in Airbnb rental apartments. You know, these 20 L bottles placed on coolers. And the shop is just 800 metres away, but is it a solution? Taxi, car rental for the whole day, or... seems, you have to carry it in on your shoulders, as always. 

But I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t ask the owner of my rented apartment, what she thought about it – seeing me with a bucket of water on my shoulders?