Hiring out your motorhome
Demand
The thought of making extra money from your motorhome maybe tempting but is it easy money or full of risk. This outline is written by the director of a hire company with over 18 years in the industry and outlines the facts for you to decide for yourself.
It is true that there is an increase in the demand for motorhome hire. Motorhomes are expensive to buy and hire customers often only want to hire for a one off event, try a different type of holiday or try before they buy. The customers can be right on your doorstep as the demand can be from anywhere in the country, but just how much business do you want. Do you want to earn a living, cover all your annual costs or settle for enough to cover your running costs?
Unlike owning property renting out a motorhome will never provide you with a living. However renting out can cover your annual costs including depreciation.
It is not worth trying to go it alone as although self drive insurance is available to an individual, it is very expensive and may not provide for all risks associated with self drive hire. You will also still have to fund your advertising.
Also be cautious of the timeshare, caretaker, guaranteed income or other joint ownership schemes as you will be locked-in in some way and lose some rights as an individual, you may not even own the motorhome so these schemes are not included here.
You can hire to friends and family to cover running costs but if you want to earn more you have to attract the right type of customer and obtain the right type of insurance and this is where you need to work with one of the professional agencies.
Good ones will screen the customers, find out who is in the party, where are they going to and if they want to bring the dogs the cat and the parrot. We do not accept every customer as they may prove more trouble than it is worth.
An agency will also provide self drive hire insurance. Your Social Domestic & Pleasure (SDP) policy will not permit cover for drivers other than yourself and named drivers, you therefore must to have other cover. But the cover provided is not a change of use to your SDP policy, or not a second policy covering the same risk, it is a completely separate policy and as such you are not obliged to advise your insurer. If you do it can cause confusion even with the underwriters and they can withdraw your cover.
What type of owner hires out their motorhome? Some are new to motorhomes and have been sold a brand new van having been told they can make money out of hiring a motorhome. That is true but others realise it is more profitable to hire a secondhand van which represents good value without incurring high depreciation costs. Others are planning to sell or upgrade their van, the van is not so precious any more and see the extra income as a step towards the funding. Others just want flexibility, they have bought the motorhome to ensure they have an annual holidays but may choose to take the income from hire rather than use it and fund a different type of holiday for a change. The owners come from all walks of life and have to have the time to do the handover or consign it to an agency to do this for them.
Owners who do the handover themselves are anxious at first but tell us they soon enjoy building new tales to tell about their experiences. You can consign the motorhome to the agency if you prefer but you must ensure the agency can prove where your motorhome is at any point in time.
The next question is how many berths is best for hire but this is not the way to think about it. Manufacturers make a range of models because people exercise choice and the same desire to choose exists in the hire market. Buy the layout that suits you. You will always enjoy it and there will always be others like you who will enjoy it too. There are though some points to consider. A vehicle over 3500 kgs will be restrict your market to drivers with a C1 entitlement and the number of passengers will be limited to the number of seats fitted with seat belts.
We have many owners who have made over £7000 in the season and plenty who are satisfied with four hires a year.
Finally damage, if you work with a good agency you are not going to have your motorhome trashed. The damage is likely to be minor and accidental, something you could have done yourself or somebody could have done to you. The hirer will have paid a damage deposit to cover this or it will be claimed on the insurance. Damage is upsetting and is the down side to owner hire but your repair costs are covered - You will make money , you will put a few more miles on the clock but not enough to reduce the value of the motorhome.
The next steps are to check out the commissions charged by the agencies. Google for "motorhome hire" and see which agencies are in strong advertising positions. Find out how well they manage their communications with you and the hirer and find out how they handle problems.
Learn more about the benifits of hiring out your own motorhome or campervan with the Motorhome Group in their motorhome owners section.