Somewhat unplanned, my recent 3 day trip to Chicago turned into a sharing economy travel extravaganza. I’ll be publishing separate posts detailing my experiences with these services, but I wanted to write a quick sum up to explain how I saved $1074 and earned $20 while taking a weekend trip to visit friends.
Peer to Peer Car Rentals: I drove to the airport and parked my car with FlightCar to save on transportation to and from the airport. Total saved = $74
Home Exchange: It’s not exactly related to this trip, but for the two weeks (including the time I was in Chicago) we were hosting the CEO of an early stage startup from London who was in town for business. He wanted to save money on lodging, and he had a budget of swap points from LoveHomeSwap to spend. So we offered him an air mattress in our small spare room. Total “earned” = 10 nights of swap points. That’s 10 nights of lodging. I’ve recently spent that many nights for a trip to Scotland so as an example, this is saving us about $1000 (and we’re staying in places that are considerably nicer than the lowest cost hotels that would charge $100 in Scotland).
Crowdsourced Delivery: I recently listed my trip on BuddyExpress and someone needed documents delivered from San Francisco to Chicago. I agreed to take the delivery. It was only a small detour upon arrival in Chicago to stop downtown and drop off the envelope. Total earned = $20.
Cost of my trip to Chicago: $136 (it was a very cheap ticket). I stayed with friends so there were no lodging expenses.
Overall savings/earnings from sharing economy travel services this week = $1094
