Need a lift?

Despite Boston’s busy traffic that might discourage many from choosing to drive a car, students sometimes still find a car on hand necessary. More often than not, however, we have our cars sitting quitely in the parking lot or garage, leaving them idle for many days, sometimes longer.

This had some in the world of business asking, “Why not share our unused cars with others who don’t have their own?”

RelayRides, a Cambridge-based company, is facilitating people to do exactly that, and is planning to expand its operations into Allston, the heartland of off-campus life for Boston University students.

Car owners who live in Cambridge and Somerville can register their cars at RelayRides, then wait for potential borrowers to reserve and rent these vehicles for a charge based on an hourly rate as determined by the owner.

To rent a car from RelayRides, one simply signs up as a member on the company’s website for free, reserves an available car parked at the location closest to him or her, and then swipes his member card on the car.

“We started a year and half ago,” said Boris Mordkovich, the director of marketing at RelayRides. “We worked out with the technology and insurance, and in May of this year we finally launched it in Cambridge. Cambridge was our pilot city.”

“It went very well, and now we are expanding,” he said. “Right now we have 50 cars and 650 members.”

“My initial reaction was similar to a lot of people, said Stuart Angus, a community organizer based in Allston who is working to bring RelayRides there. “I was skeptical that anyone could come up with an insurance policy that covers everybody for every type of car. Shelby Clark [CEO of RelayRides] said it was a big hurdle in getting RelayRides off the ground, but they found a way to make it work.”

HOW IT WORKS

There is no such thing as a central warehouse or garage of cars at RelayRides. The business’ headquaters consists of only a suite in Cambridge. Instead, the cars stay in a designated parking lot or other area where renters can pick them up.

The car keys do not change hands in this process, Mordkovich said. Instead, a smart card technology, similar to Charlie Card of MBTA, is used by borrowers to unlock the cars they rent.

“So the key still exists. It is just kept inside the car always,” Mordkovich said. “When the car is reserved, we install a small computer in the car. What the computer does is that it controls the lock, the ignition on the vehicle.”

The minimum price of renting a RelayRides car is $6 per hour. However, owners can set their own hourly rates, he said, some as high as $10.

“It includes gas and insurance,” he said.

One of the predominate carsharing business in the U.S., Zipcar, in comparison, charges hourly rates starting from $7 and an annual fee of $60 for occassional drivers at BU, according to its website.

They also offer an “extra value” plan with no annual fee, a $6.30 minimal hourly price and other discounts when the renter commits to at least $50 spending. Gas and insurance are also included in Zipcar’s rates.

Sixty-five percent of the rent RelayRides borrowers paid is given to the owner, while 20 percent is paid to the insurance company. The rest goes to RelayRides itself, he said.

When a renter is on the road, he is able to use a credit card-like gas card to fill up the tank, and the cost of gas will be billed to the owners’ account, Mordkovich said.

However, there is a milage limit for the specified time period a RelayRides car is rented, typically 160 miles a day in average, he said, and there is an extra fee charged for additional miles driven.

DESTINATION: ALLSTON

“I am not employed by RelayRides,” Angus said. “I am just a guy who lives over by Packard’s corner and who really likes the idea, so I got involved.”

After trying to rent out his own car through RelayRides and finding out it had yet to expand services to Allston, Angus became determined to bring it to the neighborhood.

He said he came to know about RelayRides when the company put up a booth at an enviornmental event, and a friend asked him about leasing his car out during a time when he was considering selling it.

“Owning and operating a car is very expensive, I think it costs me $450 per month,” he said. “I’m going to be renting out my car as well to offset the cost of owning and operating it. I figure that it’s pointless to have your car parked when you’re not using it if you could otherwise make money by renting it out with no effort.”

“I started working with RelayRides a couple months ago,” he said. “And when I heard about it I thought the idea made too much sense for it not to work.”

He said he helped promoting RelayRides in Allston by means such as putting up flyers on cars.

“So far we’ve got a few people signed up to rent out their cars,” he said. “We are hoping to get a lot of members and owners in the next few months.”

“The Allston community needs to grow,” he said. At first there will be a limited number of cars, but when people recognize how valuable the system is, I’m confident that more and more car owners and car renters will join in the system. I also believe this could work because the RelayRides community started up in Cambridge only a few months ago and they now have over 50 cars available to be rented.”

“I think at BU we can have a big impact for a number of reasons,” he said.

He said by sharing cars, the total number of cars needed would be reduced, thereby benefitting the environment.

“The more shared cars there are, the less cars are needed on the road,” he said. “We feel that this is in alignment with sustainability@BU initiative.”

The service would also give students who brought their cars to college an extra source of income, he said, while students who need cars would be able to have access to them more easily.

“Renting out your own car gives you the opportunity to help out other students or neighbors by providing them with a cheap and convenient mode of transportation,” he said.

“You can also make a lot of money in the mean time. By renting their cars through RelayRides a student can make thousands of dollars a year, probably equivalent to what one can make with a work-study job,” he said. “So I guess it would be similar to having a work-study job, just without any of the work.”

Mordkovich said RelayRides would likely initiate its service in Allston and Jamaica Plains in about a month.

Business to enable car-sharing among Allston residents

GOOD FOR THE YOUTH

It might be frustating for BU students under 21 who can’t yet rent from ZipCar. But RelayRides fills this gap, Angus said.

According to ZipCar’s website, it provides service to students who are over 18 in some locations, such as Harvard and Yale, in which people who are 18 to 20 years old have only access to “dedicated group of Zipcars that live on campus”, while at other places such as BU it has yet to allow people under 21 to rent Zipcars.

“It works for everybody, but it will be particularly appealing for freshmen and sophomores under the age of 21,” Angus said. “Zipcar requires renters to be 21 years old to use their service. You have to be 18 to rent a RelayRides car if you are covered under your parents’ or your own insurance policy.”

This age difference among RelayRides, ZipCar and regular car rentals is due to specific insurance agreements and regulations, he said.

“Anyboy over the age of 21 does not need any insurance. If you are 18 to 20, you still don’t have to have any insurance but you need to show a copy of your parents’ policy,” Mordkovich said. “It’s just a formality that we require.”

“I just really wish this system existed when I was in college,” Angus said.

When asked whether RelayRides was to be a competitor of ZipCar, Mordkovich said not necessarily.

“I wouldn’t say a competitor per se. We complement each other fairly well,” he said. “A lot of ZipCar members become RelayRides members as well because it is cheaper. There are more cars available so there is more diversity.”

He said it depends much on geographical distance whether a person would use ZipCar or RelayRides, but RelayRides does have an advantage in price.

“It’s not cheap to become a ZipCar member, you have to pay an annual fee,” he said, while RelayRides does not charge such a fee and generally has a lower hourly rate.