Renting bike to guests

Bike rental

We are thinking of getting a couple of bikes for our Airbnb that will be for guest use. Should we ask guests to sign waivers before using them, or is this an excessive request? Does anyone have experience lending bikes to guests?

Thanks!


Deborah

we do loan bikes (don't rent). Have not had a problem but maybe we should ask guests to sign waivers. I will be interested to see what others have to say.
This weekend we were guests and were also provided bikes with no helmets and were not asked to sign waivers. (We do provide helmets.)

Deborah

This is a great question to ask the host community.

There is a very convenient way to rent bikes to guests if you are concerned about liability, and that is, to list your bike on what is essentially the "airbnb" of the bicycle world, namely www.spinlister.com You can list bikes there and guests can rent thru there,and rentals thru that site come with insurance and liability coverage.

That said, I have rented bikes directly to guests (not thru spinlister) for over 2 years and not had trouble with that. I have however spent more money than I would have liked on bike repairs, so that the amount of money I'm making on bike rentals just barely squeaks by to cover what I have spent on bike repairs and maintenance (the bikes I rent were old to start with -- which leads to more maintenance needs -- but I would not be willing to let a guest take a bike that was a nice new expensive one....)


Deborah

Another manuever I once gave in response to this same question, was this arrangement -- if you are concerned about liability for guest using your bike, then dont' rent the guest the bike - -- SELL the guest the bike -- and be willing to buy the bike back from the guest when they are done with it.

If you SELL The bike to the guest instead of renting it, you have absolutely no liability for them on it since it is their bike.

The practical aspects of this are simple -- if you normally would rent a bike to a guest for $40 for one week's use plus $150 security deposit (or maybe higher deposit for a better bike but I do not recommend allowing a guest to use a bike that is worth more than about $250-300 -- get beater bikes for guests) then, you would need to collect $190 from guest in advance for renting the bike -- sec deposit returned when they turn in the bike.

So instead, what you do is to tell guest, that they will pay you the same amount $190, to buy the bike, and then you will buy it back from them for $150 when they are done with it. So the end result is the same. Guest got to use the bike for a week for $40, you got $40 for their use of the bike. BUt you did it all without any liability on your part.

Guest only has to trust that you will actually buy the bike back like you said you would, but you could put it in writing I guess to help...