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Owning nothing is now a luxury, thanks to a number of subscription startups
- mherdeg 7y agoIf the business model for CaaStle does not work out, but I can accurately predict when they will go out of business, should I sign up to rent a bunch of stuff that month and hope I get to keep it after the shutdown?
- danhak 7y agoPresumably those assets would belong to the company’s creditors.
- bsder 7y agoI'd imagine collecting it would be more than the furniture would be worth. It's not like they're going to be renting you luxury goods on the cheap. (Although, if they can get VC money to subsidize renting stuff below cost ... I smell a unicorn ...)
- anbop 7y agoSure, but don’t underestimate the appetite of VCs to keep funding these businesses, leaving you renting a lamp for $20/month or whatever.
- iscrewyou 7y agoAnd after they extract a $100 for the lamp, sure, you can keep it if we go under.
- jijji 7y agoi was evicting some tenants who had a brand new bed from rent-a-center, and the guys came to pick it up.... one of them forgot his hex screw driver, and called into the manager to say he "saw bed bugs" and then they gave the guy the bed for free -- actually i wound up taking it, but i think if u say "bed bugs" when it comes to those beds, all of a sudden they dont want it back (no it didnt have bed bugs)
- maccard 7y agoI returned a mattress under one of those 90 day "no questions asked" return policies, and when they came to pick it up they said because it wasn't in the plastic wrapping that they wouldn't lift it, but they'd deliver my new mattress and mark the old one as disposed.
- whatshisface 7y agoThis seems dangerous, like people are going to spend 100% of their paycheck every month and get everything taken away from them if they go a week without a job.
- staticautomatic 7y agoIt's the Rent-A-Center model.
- walrus01 7y agoWelcome to modern serfdom, implemented by app. Your boss is an app, your job is classified as an "independent contractor", you own nothing. You can never get off the treadmill of wage slavery.
- Jgrubb 7y ago16 tons and what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt. St. Peter don't you call me cause I can't go, I owe my soul to the company store.
- pembrook 7y agoOr on the flipside, I've got some contractor/consulting buddies who regularly pull down $200/hr bouncing between Tech companies in the Bay Area and Seattle and big banks in NYC. Not owning anything allows you to go where the work is and keep your net worth in assets that produce actual income (like index funds and bonds), instead of sitting around collecting unemployment during a dry spell because you're encumbered by your depreciating assets. I'm sure some people will use this as a way to temporarily live beyond their means...but it's not like Credit Cards don't enable this behavior already. The US is the land of the free of course, where we allow the weak to be preyed upon.
- walrus01 7y agoThis is a lot different if you're making $140,000/year gross vs the typical "rent to own" market of Aaron's and Rent-a-center for household furnishings, where the consumers make significantly less than that.
- m463 7y agoThis might be more interesting if there was more competition and prices were more inline with the cost of purchasing. It might be I don't understand the costs though. Is renting furniture or clothing like leasing a car, or is it more expensive (or less expensive)?
- rhexs 7y agoA decent couch from crate and barrel probably goes for 800-1200 or so. At 50/month for a couch, you’d pay the cost to buy it outright in two years. It would also be interesting to see what they charge for any stains/damage. Is “normal wear and tear” a thing or do they use the landlords definition of “anything I think I can get away with”. Math looks a bit better if you do long distance moves constantly. Not a frugal option in any sense, but if you have plenty of disposable income and value minimalism and simple moves, sure, why not. Edit - Couch pricing a bit off (looks like they’re around 1500-2000, but I doubt they’re renting things at that quality and I’m sure furniture has some fantastic bulk pricing) Probably paid off in 2.5/3 years of renting.
- baroffoos 7y agoThe cost can not be inline with purchasing because the store still has to purchase it, have all the overhead of running a store and then over the lifespan of the item, make up all of those costs as well as making some profit on it.
- RickJWagner 7y ago"Many young American urbanites have resigned themselves to a life of non-ownership, abandoning the dream of their parents and grandparents and great-grandparents before them, often out of financial necessity. But renting isn’t just a matter of necessity these days. It’s become almost posh." They're doing it wrong.
- lscharen 7y ago“It is quite likely that, when you lived in America, you leased everything. You never owned anything, but someone else did and you had to pay for every single thing you used. That's another form of resource ownership that concentrates wealth.” — Manna, Chapter 5 — https://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm
- theamk 7y agoNot really. Manna is about minimum wage workers suddenly losing all law’s protections and safety nets; and this article focuses on people like “founder of a holistic wellness-focused tech start-up in Los Angeles”
- zwkrt 7y agoHire do you think these startups intend to get their hockey stick growth?
- whatshisface 7y agoThese companies don't want to be seen as secondhand shops for poor millennials, they want to be seen as trendy lifestyle outlets for rich people that poor millennials want to emulate. That's branding 101. The reality is something else...
- Loughla 7y agoThat's exactly right. Rentals of furniture and appliances have been around for years - Rent-a-Center. It's just like the new 'trend' of Van-Dwellers or tiny homes. Sure, you open up your travel opportunities, but this isn't new. It just used to be called homelessness and low-income housing.
- JMTQp8lwXL 7y agoI'm still not convinced this is good for companies. They think everyone will stick around and keeping paying, unwavering loyalty month-after-month, when in reality, many people cancelled their HBO subscription after Game of Thrones was over. It doesn't really solve the volatility problem for business income. When the next downturn hits, guess what will be the first thing to go? Frivolous subscriptions.
- rishav_sharan 7y agoI actually do this. I have rented 2 king size beds, a sofa, a 200l fridge, 40 inch led tv, small ac and a dining table for around $120 per month. In return i get complete peace of mind, free maintenance and the ability to update my furniture for no reason other than i want to. I personally am pretty happy with renting most of this stuff but will be buying my own dtuff once i have my own house
- mehrdadn 7y agoSorry but do you find this ends up being wasteful at all? I don't know how many of/how much these items can be reused, but it feels like it would promote far faster consumption than ownership.
- dawhizkid 7y agoHow did you come to that conclusion? The effect is the complete opposite...instead of a lot of people that move frequently (i.e. younger people) and buy/toss a lot of cheap Ikea furniture every year, you rent high end, long-lasting furniture that is delivered/removed for reuse.
- Retra 7y agoWhen I moved frequently I bought an inflatable bed or cot. I didn't buy a king sized bed and throw it out every two years. That's insane.
- seem_2211 7y agoI think the answer is there are different options for different people - some people (like yourself) are happy buying an inflatable bed and sleeping on that. Others would prefer to rent a king sized bed. I don't think one is necessarily right or wrong. Choice is a good thing!
- mehrdadn 7y agoI think the distinction of interest in the parent comment wasn't inflatable vs. king sized, the distinction was throwing away king sized every 2 years vs., well, not doing that.
- elicash 7y agoThis article describes a minor (but real) trend among a small group of wealthy young people. While some of the services described have a bit wider reach (particularly clothing companies), there's nothing THAT concerning about people with lots of disposable income doing what people with disposable income have always done -- spend it.
- chrisco255 7y agoRenting an apartment vs owning a house is not necessarily a bad financial move. Depends on a number of factors. For instance, if you anticipate moving within a certain time frame, between closing costs, mortgage fees, commission, etc...it can cost more to own in the first 3-5 years, especially if prices are stagnant. Also, there are hidden costs of home ownership not necessarily factored in for, like repairs, maintenance, etc that are just implicitly included in rent. Finally, one can use the savings from paying rent to invest in the stock market and generally get a higher return than real estate.
- Bombthecat 7y agoEspecially in Germany, where there is a new law coming out every five to ten years where you need to isolate your house or build solar or replace your old gas heater etc etc etc. Its all in the name of environment protection. But makes owning a house more of a risk then anything else..
- cheschire 7y agoIf you establish regular communication with your Gemeindeverwaltung, and simply get approval for all changes and renovations, you will never be surprised.
- ccozan 7y agoI live in Germany and I never heard of this "need". Nobody forces you. Yes, you may want to change your old heating (that's what I do), but you get a lot of subvention from the state. You do this, then you also get some good terms on taxing etc. Same with electricity. You get a better insurance policy if you have it new.
- foepys 7y agoActually, you have to replace your heating every 30 years. Unless you are exempt, which is becoming more and more unlikely. See EnEV §10.
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- baroffoos 7y agoThis is just another move from mega corps to tricking us in to paying a subscription for everything and never owning anything. Owning pretty much always ends up cheaper if you will have the item for a long time. Renting only makes sense for short term needs. I don't need to buy expensive equipment I only use once a year so renting that makes sense but for a couch it makes far more sense to buy it outright and use it for 10+ years rather than pay constantly for it. I suspect that even this article itself is a hidden marketing move to change social norms so people think renting is the cool new thing to show off.
- dawhizkid 7y agoWell most of these companies are startups, not megacorps. Just like everything you should do the math...if you only plan to live in a city or apartment for 1-2 years then renting a furnished apartment (either officially furnished or DIY with one of these startups) could make sense. The alternative in my experience is buying a lot of cheap Ikea furniture that's a pain to buy/put together/toss that may or may not come out to what you'd pay renting much nicer furniture with assembly/delivery included both ways.
- baroffoos 7y agoThis article pushes the idea that this is not just for people planing to leave soon but for anyone who wants to live the luxury life which is just ridiculous. Also megacorps have been pushing for this as well, for example the trend to pay a huge monthly fee for your phone and plan which forces you to essentially buy a new phone every 2 years.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoWhat definition of “force” are you using? What is stopping someone from finishing paying the monthly cost of the phone after 2 years and then not signing a new contract to lease a new phone? Every single mobile provider in the US makes it clear how much mobile service is if you want to pay for just the mobile network, or to lease the phone and the mobile network. Apple offers a monthly payment plan that is equivalent in cost to paying upfront for the same phone and AppleCare+. All of the information is clearly available for the lease vs pay upfront, and mobile network vs mobile network + phone calculation.
- rietta 7y agoIts hard to wrap my head around renting furniture and cloths. Most of the pieces in my house are gifts from family, many are antiques and very functional. Getting married and buying a house was all the excuse our families needed to set us up. I know not everyone has this but many do. Saved a ton of money vs buying new or renting.
- osdiab 7y agoI don’t rent furniture but I see the appeal - I myself am not in a stable living situation (nor do I want one at the moment), I like living in different places and don’t want to deal with moving, reselling or disposing furniture every time I make a move. Some people’s solution to that is renting everything, mine is just to live lean (small place, minimal furniture, just for sleeping and simple cooking really).
- dagw 7y agoWhen my wife and I bought a house we had to almost barricade the driveway to prevent our families from dumping all their old 'junk' on us. While we do have a bunch of stuff from our families, for us buying our furniture for our place to make it like we wanted was an important part of making the house ours.
- rietta 7y agoUnderstand! We lived by the motto "don't look a gift horse in the mouth". We were quite cash poor after getting married and buying a house in the same year :-)
- harmegido 7y agoSo you're argument against renting is: "why rent when you can have your parents buy it for you?" It sounds to me a lot like the "let them eat cake" mentality.
- drivingmenuts 7y agoThis doesn’t sound like the worst idea ever. If you lose your income, just say “come and get it” and you’ve significantly lowered the cost of moving/finding storage, etc. while you search for a new job. I kinda wish I’d thought of this before a couple of bad years of the Universe deciding it didn’t much like me much. I’m sort of back on my feet (employed) but I don’t own much more than some minimal furniture, clothes, car and computer gear. The rest could easily be filled by renting. Most of the other things wouldn’t have much resale value anyway, if I bought it outright.
- pluma 7y agoSure, I mean if you're unemployed, what's the use for furniture or a bed? And it's inconceivable that you might remain unemployed for any extended duration or not have savings (or sufficiently affluent relatives) to fall back on. Pardon the sarcasm but I sincerely doubt you know what you're talking about if your biggest worry was moving/storing/selling your furniture.
- drivingmenuts 7y agoMy biggest worry was trying to find a job followed by what do I do with all this stuff when I got evicted. By that point, I didn’t have savings left and no family to fall back on. I slept on an air mattress for the best part of a year in a borrowed room of a very kind (mostly) stranger. I got through it, but I do not want to ever be in a position again where I have to watch my stuff get given away because it’s old crappy stuff that can’t be sold for food money. By renting, I can have a few nice things and when I can’t, we’ll, too bad, but I need that money for something else, like food or medecine.
- pluma 7y agoThen your mistake is just thinking you'll end up in a financially better position by renting. Companies do things because they are profitable. Also, I don't see how "being unable to sell your stuff because it's crappy and old and having to give it away for free" is worse than "being unable to sell your stuff because it didn't belong to you in the first place and is taken away as soon as you lapse a payment". Except of course in the former case some other poor person might still get some use out of the old and crappy stuff and in the other case some company is taking the (relatively new) thing and likely just shredding it.
- QuadrupleA 7y agoNot sure about furniture and clothing, but Joymode sounds interesting - kitchen gadgets, game consoles, VR headsets etc. Things someone might want to try, but could just sit around unused once the initial excitement is over. REI also, for outdoor gear - I've got backpacking stuff that sits in the basement doing nothing most of the year. It's much easier to acquire things than unacquire them - selling on craigslist, carting things off to goodwill, or lugging them around during a move is a hassle. Being able to just tell a company you're done, and they'll come pick it up, has a definite appeal. Guess it comes down to doing the math on actual costs and disposal/move/recycle effort. One of my random interests last year was stargazing and astronomy - I bought a cheap telescope because I wasn't sure how long-term interested I'd be, and after a few weeks of heavy use it's been mostly sitting around. Might have been better value to rent a more expensive one while my time & interest were high.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago> It's much easier to acquire things than unacquire them That's a good point. I wish it was easier. I have a lot of things in my home I'd like to get rid of and which still could be of use to someone else. I'd gladly sell them for a dollar or two each, but at that price point it isn't even worth the time I'm spending writing this HN comment, much less putting it up on an auction, paying the processing fee, and mailing it to someone. I could give them away for free on one of the local giveaway/exchange groups, but the very thought of getting someone to drive a couple kilometers to pick up a dollar-item makes me cringe - it's a ridiculously anti-environmental practice. It's one of the reasons I tend to put not-completely-destroyed things on a side of a trash container in our neighbourhood - a local dumpster diver may appreciate it and get extra mileage from things I no longer need.
- martin_a 7y ago> I wish it was easier. I have a lot of things in my home I'd like to get rid of and which still could be of use to someone else. But wasn't it like this some years ago? I think I sold so much stuff I didn't need anymore on eBay and sometimes made good money from it. Nowadays eBay is not very user-friendly for private people and therefore unusable for this. "eBay Kleinanzeigen" (not sure if this exists outside of Germany) is there, but it's lacking the auction features which made selling stuff so much fun...
- seem_2211 7y agoThis is a really interesting trend - and one that brings out some really fascinating psychology in people and how they relate to money. I am personally uncomfortable with the idea of renting clothing, and don't like the idea of renting a bed or furniture, but am a big fan of renting a car (Zipcar) and will probably rent ski gear for next years season. Like most things, some people go all in, and decide to rent everything. But my hunch would be that most people will find 1-2 things they don't want to necessarily shell out full price for, and will rent for a bit, before probably buying the gear themselves at some point.
- parrellel 7y agoAh! Debt Peonage! Now for the clerical classes.
- charlesism 7y agoThe article really does read like propaganda to reposition “debt peonage” as “aspirational debt peonage”
- mrhektor 7y agoI think the trick is only owning assets that might appreciate in value. I wouldn't want to own a car because the value of cars drops as soon as you take the car out of the lot. But owning a house /apartment might be a good idea if the market is relatively stable and you can actually afford it. It also depends on lifestyle. For a person like me, who moves around a lot, owning furniture for example doesn't make sense. The moving costs, maintenance costs and so on are just a pain. I'd rather rent the furniture, or rent a furnished place.
- tialaramex 7y agoThe house doesn't appreciate in value. You can tell because they do _make_ houses which don't appreciate in value. They're often called "mobile" homes although in practice moving them is tremendously expensive and they'll most likely be put up in one place and never leave. They don't appreciate because the materials they are made from decay, needing ongoing maintenance or reducing the value. What actually does appreciate is _real property_ aka land. Because there will only ever be a finite amount of that, and each parcel is in a particular place and can't be moved. If everybody wants to live in Brisbane, or Guernsey, the price of land there explodes because it simply isn't possible. And even then, appreciation is driven by population. In a world where population stops growing or even shrinks, prices for real property may fall in most places.
- tehjoker 7y agoI love not having money and therefore paying extra for the convenience of having the items required for basic dignity in decent condition in the richest country on earth.
- flukus 7y ago> The items that are being offered for temporary ownership to this cohort are a far cry from the Rent-A-Centers of the world, which target cash-strapped consumers who often lack access to credit. Fernish, for example, is geared toward young people whose design sense comes straight from Instagram, Pinterest and West Elm’s catalog. The company, founded in 2017, trades in imitation Eames shell chairs, midcentury-style wooden dressers and Art Deco-inspired bar carts, offering brands like Crate & Barrel and more boutique names like Campaign. So they're basically high end rent-a-centers? Apart from the exact products I'm not really seeing what's new, the business model goes back to at least 1930 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Rentals https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Rentals) and has all the legitimacy of the payday loan industry.
- stunt 7y agoAfter successfully implementing the illusion of control, we want to implement the illusion of wealth now. A good way to make more money! I'm not against the concept. But I'm not fully sold. The subscription model is great for many things but not everything. Companies are seeing this as a new opportunity and they're driving their marketing strategies around it by selling a subscription model to everything.
- CPLX 7y agoWhen I was a kid in the 80’s renting home furnishings, driving a taxi on the side, and renting out spare rooms in your house were all very common activities too. They were generally things people did because they didn’t have stable well paying jobs. That’s still the reason. All this disruptive new economy rebranding notwithstanding.
- scottlocklin 7y agoI'm waiting for rentacenter to rebrand itself as "appliances and furniture as a service."
- rchaud 7y agoIf they don't, you can be sure that Techcrunch will profile a scrappy startup doing exactly this, closing multi-million funding rounds on the promise of being "WeWork for furnishings".
- burke_holland 7y agoThis is exactly what I thought of when I read this article. Rent-A-Center has been doing this for longer than I've been alive.
- mkane848 7y agoI see monthly payment plans for $25 shirts. I didn't realize it had gotten this bad until that moment, but we've been creeping toward installment plans and subscription services over ownership for a few years now and it's absolutely wild that it's not a warning sign that no one can actually afford to own anything upfront anymore.
- nnone 7y agoCapitalist Utopia: Work your whole life, to own nothing. So you will continue to work for us because of the fear of losing everything (we rented to you).
- vinceguidry 7y agoCapitalism can't work without consumers, and consumerism can't work unless you can convince consumers they're better off as a cog in a machine. What capitalism degrades into when this doesn't happen isn't communism but rather mercantilism, or, if there isn't enough economic activity for even that, feudalism. And no one wants that. I didn't realize how this could work until I looked at my own life and realized I would rather be an IC than a manager. I still want to own my own means of production and earn economic freedom, but on my own terms. If I can't get it on my own terms, being a cog in someone else's machine isn't really all that bad. Reframed this way, it's less a battle of haves vs have nots and more a cooperative project to make more for all. Ultimately capitalism has to find a way to incorporate the best parts of communism.
- justsomeguy3591 7y ago> I didn't realize how this could work until I looked at my own life and realized I would rather be an IC than a manager. Maybe a dumb question, but what is an IC in this context?
- vinceguidry 7y agoIndividual contributor. Works great for me because I was never much of a joiner. My faith gets broken too easily.
- justsomeguy3591 7y agoThat makes sense. Definitely feel like I'm adopting a similar mindset myself.
- mark_l_watson 7y agoI have thought about this lately because my wife and I moved to Illinois so I could accept a job managing a machine learning team. I retired and now we are just now moving back to Arizona. I spent five hours yesterday watching our stuff being wrapped and put on a truck. Lots of possessions. The thing is, I have some stuff that I really like. A teak bookcase I bought in the 1970s when I got my first real job after finishing school. A huge teak desk my wife bought me 20 years ago. My wife has some furniture her grandmother had and that she grew up with. We also have art and things we have bought while traveling around the world. I see the advantages of not being encumbered by ‘stuff’ but some possessions help define our personal history and are simply a pleasure to own.
- grecy 7y agoKeep it if it brings you happiness, after all, that's the point. It's the rest of the stuff that can go. I helped a friend move last month. After we'd been to the 5 places she kept her stuff, we discovered she had 5 coffee machines, 5 cutting boards, 5 juicers, etc. etc. The things you describe make you happier and are not stuff. The things I described are just stuff.
- pjc50 7y ago> 5 places she kept her stuff Storage unit rental, now that's a means of preying on people who can't let go and/or move often. (It strikes me that there might be startup value in "home inventory management", although it would have to be made as frictionless as possible - wave a camera round your kitchen, inside all the cupboards, get a list of everything you own. Snoop your Amazon webpages so it can remind you not to buy things you already have.)
- cameronbrown 7y agoSortly[0] might do what you're suggesting though not as simply as you described. [0] sortly.com
- ghaff 7y agoFortunately(?) I have a fair bit of storage space at home. It's definitely a battle to pull out and get rid of stuff in storage after I haven't looked or used it for a few years. It's really tempting to throw things in storage rather than make the decision to get rid of them--especially when there's some effort associated with disposing of an item.
- suff 7y agoRenting everything means you go from managing dozens of objects to dozens of contracts. Imagine managing acceptable use, wear and tear, cost depreciation, return dates, rate increases, and of course your time to manage this is counted as zero in the cost model. Sounds like a nightmare.
- EGreg 7y agoHere is my thinking: I want to rent, not own. And that includes a home, at least until I have a family. Why? Besides the optionality of moving, or not worrying about flooding etc. Lots of things are not necessary to be exclusively owned by you, anyway, like a car that you park every day to collectively take up tons of space on city roads. It’s because every time you buy something you invest in it. That’s money you could have invested elsewhere (opportunity cost). Say you had $100K in 2011. You could either: A) Make a down payment on a house, live in it, and keep buildng equity in it B) Do that, but rent out the house to another person and use the money to rent anywhere else C) Rent the house you live in and invest in Bitcoin instead Guess which strategy would have had you far far ahead. C is better than B which is better than A. And that’s why I prefer to rent. Decouple orthogonal things: using and investing.
- ZeroFries 7y agoI personally like buying used, keeping it in good shape or even improving on the bought condition, and re-selling when I no longer need it/am moving. My aunt's mother-in-law just moved back to England from Canada. She spent thousands to ship back junk. She could have sold or donated most of it and used the money to buy all new stuff back home and been way better off for it.