Corena
I did that for a while in Missouri. At one time I had over 125 pianos out on retal. It takes a lot of capital to acquire the pianos. I used money from my day to day tuning and repair business to buy the piano, but later on, since I also sold new piano, I used all the money available to do that.
You need to establish a contract that you can live with. I used the rental contract from Aaron's as a template. It contained all the legal language, but adopted for my own situation.
When I bought a piano, I paid a mover to take it to my place. When I rented a piano, the customer paid for moving the piano to their house, and also paid to have it moved back. I also collected one month rent. So the up front cost was kind of high. They got a coupon book, just like when you buy a car. But you can also have the customer use a credit card for payment. That's much easier, but you have to make sure you keep up with the expiration date.
I had a clause in the contract that required the renter to pay me to tune the piano every 6 months. But that was hard to enforce. Why have a renter return the piano just because they didn't have it tuned?
The rental income was very good money. I charged the equivalent of paying off the piano at 18% interest over 5 years. I allowed the renter to buy the piano, with 100% of the first 6 months, 50% of the second six months, and 25% of the third six months applied to the purchase price. The purchase price was higher than the piano would normally sell. So when the customer did buy the piano, I got top dollar for it.
Renters would rent between 6 months and a couple of years.
Now the bad news. If they don't pay, unless they cooperate, it is very difficulty to get the piano back. You can go to court, but that costs money. When you get the ruling that the customer has to return the piano, that's all that is. A ruling. If they don't abide by it, by the time you pay the sheriff, and the movers, to execute the judge's order, you might be better off just letting the customer keep the piano.
Basically, customers who don't pay the rent on their piano probably are dead beats in other areas, and they know how to beat the system.
One thing I didn't do was run a credit check on each customers because it costs extra. But my philosophy has always been, that people who are interested in music are a cut above the average scum, and the chances of getting a deadbeat are slim. Over the 8 years I ran my rental business, I probably had over 500 pianos come and go. Of those, only 5 wound up being dead beats. But it's hard to figure out who will be one, as one of those deadbeats was a multimillionaire, who rented 2 pianos, one for his house, and one for his ex-wife's house, so that his daughter could play.
I sold my rental business when I left St. Louis, but there were 5 customers who were dead beats. Even with the help of a lawyer, one of them gave me one more month, but the rest vanished, with my pianos.
Good luck.
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Willem "Wim" Blees, RPT
Mililani, HI 96789
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Original Message:
Sent: 05-06-2014 15:40
From: Corena Casemy
Subject: Piano Rentals
Anyone here dabble in renting pianos? I'm curious what your experience has been, where you find rental clients, how long do people typically rent the piano, do you have the client pay all or some of the moving costs, etc. I've received some great input from a local colleague of mine but enjoy hearing a variety of experiences to help me decide how I want to proceed, or even if I want to move forward with it at all! Tell me the good, bad & the ugly. Thanks!
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Corena Casemy
Owner Technician
Miss Piano Tuner
Snoqualmie, WA
(425) 281-2849
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