A former finance worker is paying his mortgage with an income from a lucrative side hustle
A Cranbourne man who lost his job in the coronavirus crisis is keeping his head above water by ramping up a lucrative from-home business which is paying his mortgage — and anyone with a car can sign up to the simple scheme.
South East
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A lucrative side hustle is seeing a Cranbourne man through the dark days of COVID-19.
Mark Mathews is among the one million Australians who lost their job as a result of the global pandemic.
But by renting several vehicles out on peer-to-peer car sharing platform Car Next Door, Mr Mathews will be able to continue to meet his mortgage payments while he's out of work.
He said the side hustle nets him about $2500 a month on average.
“I reckon I’ll be off work until January at least — I've gone from about 400 jobs a month to just six (since COVID-19),” the former finance worker said.
Mr Mathews signed up to Car Next Door nearly two years ago, hiring out his Ford Territory, Hyuandai iLoad and Mercedes-Benz Vito.
He said the vans had proved to be a good money spinner, often being hired several times a day for short trips.
“In the past month they’ve been hired out for a lot of trips to Bunnings or to pick up furniture,” he said.
“It’s $50 an hour to rent them so if you can make the trip in that time, it’s often cheaper than paying for delivery.
“Often I see them hired out for a couple of hours, it comes back, then it’s gone again — they’re being hired out several times a day.”
Mr Mathews ensures the vehicles are thoroughly cleaned and sanitised after each trip and he has provides hand sanitiser and gloves.
“That stuff is hard to get at the moment so thankfully none of it has been stolen yet,” he said.
Mr Mathews, who is not eligible for any government grants, said the Car Next Door money meant he could keep making his mortgage payments.
“The only thing I can do is access my super and I really don’t want to do that,” he said.
“(Car Next Door) gives me a little bit of income and it’s just me and a puppy so we can ride this out okay.
“As long as my mortgage gets paid, I can manage the rest.”
A recent Car Next Door study found that while the majority of users were travelling less than usual, many were relying on the platform for their essential travel.
About 75 per cent of members had stopped or significantly reduced their use of public transport and were choosing car sharing as the safest and best alternative for those essential trips.
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Car Next Door chief executive and co-founder Will Davies said a number of frontline health workers were using the platform to get to work since COVID-19 hit.
“There are a lot of healthcare workers that need transport and don't want to be travelling on densely populated public transport,” he said.
“Now that it’s become much harder to get online food delivery, we also have many members (using share cars) to deliver food to people in need.”