starting a rental company?

A

amoildani

Well-known member
how would i even begin to look into renting out my equipment. im pretty sure there's A LOT more things than i think there is to going into doing this, but anyone have any experience...such as...legal things, contracts, insuring it wont get broken then not paid for, stolen, etc, etc..
just looking at possibilities for its paying itself off (rates around here are 150-200/day for the dvx alone), while it sits in my closets on days im not using it.
 
Re: starting a rental company?

go get an attorney to hook you up with an LLC. He'll set up your rental contracts for you as well (for an hourly rate, od course). That and insurence and your set.
 
whats an LLC , limited Liability clause?

what about registering your business? and how does one go about getting insurance, just from the insurance carrier?

I would imagine there's more to fill out. If I made a rental contract, do I need to 'register' it or something to make it official to the courts?

Also, how do you insure that if the person moves out of the country and takes my camera, that I won't be screwed over?
 
Ah yes, the rental minefield...

Ah yes, the rental minefield...

First off, an LLC is short for Limited Liability Corporation (some will say Company). Many professionals, such as Lawyers take up this form of business model. This means they can be part of a law firm which has entities like senior partners and still act for themselves as a company.

Business format aside, most places which rent also sell. This is to avoid the worries you're going to have, such as loss due to theft etc.

They will take product inventory which maybe has been written down in value to a point where it makes sense to move it into rental inventory. Loss due to damage, theft etc. doesn't hit the bottom line as hard.

I see from your post that your plan is to help pay off your gear. Thats entirely up to you and I'm not going to go into all of the scenarios about renting issues etc.

What I will say, is its always important to know what you are truly passionate about. If its making movies, then pay off your gear by making movies.

"Don't just think you can, know you can!" - Morpheus to Neo

Cheers
 
Your questions indicate that maybe you should consider taking a small business course or three at the local college. Any business is fraught with traps if you are totally ignorant about the rules andprocedures.
 
Thanks for your suggestions.

craigbowman, so are you saying there's no way to be safe if one would steal my camera? There's no way to cover it through insurance, or a way to have the person tracked down, etc? It seems the only way I'll be fail-safe is to require that I go along with the camera and be on set.
Does making one sign a contract all it takes to transfer responsbility to them if anything were to happen?

If I could make money making movies...i would. But the fact is with college and work, I use the camera maybe 2-3 times a month, so for 25 days a month it just sits in my closet, and Im seeing if there's a way I can make some money off of it during those days.

I'll look into LLC now, and see what I can do with that.


galt, I'm minoring in business and am actually in a business law class right now, but haven't recieved any info on this part (mostly a general class)
 
The certainty of uncertainty..

The certainty of uncertainty..

The short answer is Yes. There is no guarantee of perferct protection. Even the things which you believe to be certain, such as insurance etc. may not work out the way they are supposed to. Getting insurance is one thing, claiming is another. Also, what is the deductable etc.

All of the steps you take will have a cost associated with them which of course you have to factor in to what you will charge. The time you spend also has a "cost". As you have pointed out, you have a number of other issues on the go, such as your studies, work, etc.

I certainly don't want to be a bucket of cold water. However, once you start shelling out time and money to set this up, how much rental will it take to pay off these additional costs, before you actually get to the break even, where the rentals are in the black and that money is used to pay off your gear as your plan was. Who is the target market for your gear. How will you market? What costs will be associated with that? How much time will that eat up?

Nothing is to say however, that you might do this and everything goes without a hitch. I'm not a statistician. If you don't want to incur the time to put a business plan together, then at least work up a project charter.

At the very least, find a local rental dealer and pump them for as much information as you can.

Best of Luck!

(The difference between education and experience. With experience, first you get the test, then you get the lesson!)
 
One thing that no one has mentioned yet is.......INVESTMENT. The local rental companies don't just hire a camera to you, they're more than likely to have mattebox, Light weight support, wide angle lenses 2, 3 or 4 batteries, field monitor, Flightcase and a half decent tripod. So you're looking at a considerable cost to invest in the appropriate gear to match the level of support the rental guys do so well. You'd not only have to have 1 kit, you'd have to have at least 3 kits available at any one time. Now thats gonna cost! and most rental companies will offer 24/7 support.

Scenario: You hire your kit to a production, the assistant drops it. Ask yourself, can you provide a replacement within less than 24hrs to keep the production rolling?

Scenario: You hire your kit to a production, the assistant drops it. You've got a shoot the following day. You now have the additional cost of (A) Hiring kit to keep you shooting and (B) Replacing or repairing the damaged camera.

I'n my humble opinion and it is only an opinion DON'T DO IT, IT's NOT WORTH THE GRIEF.

Cheers
 
What everybody said. You are better off to sell yourself (including camera) to local production companies as their second cam, etc. A few hours at a wedding as second or third cam should be worth $200, get you some experience, and you won't have to worry about camera abuse.
 
Remember if you're in business renting out your camera, your main competitor would be GEAR Rentals in Austin. So, they could just throw in some film accessories if someone asks them, "but so-and-so has a cheaper rental price..." They're pretty smart chaps over at GEAR and I don't seriously think, as a purpose of trying to be helpful here, you'd be very successful at a commercial enterprise of renting out your camcorder. I do think, however, that you could find some friends or friends of friends who need a camera and maybe work something out that way--essentially on a good will level--not a corporate entity level and make a few bucks. But, really, honestly, to tell you the truth alot of people own DVX's in Austin. If anything, the projects I've worked on they'll own the camera and just rent the cine' accessories as needed, since they know they'll need the camera to playback tapes when they go in to post. As I said, I'm just trying to add perspective to the situation. I don't think starting a single product rental company is a very intelligent thing to do and definitely not with a commodity item like a DVX. Should you choose to do it anyway, you might consult with Karen Marshall at Marshall Entertainment Insurance in Orlando, Fl. They'll be able to give you a good quote for what you're trying to do, but as a warning, I think the minimum policy is 38K in coverage for about 800/year. I just don't see the value in that for what you're wanting to do. I think if you know the people who are checking your camera out then you'd (probably) be fine, but you never know. Repairs are expensive. Stolen cameras are worse.

brian wells
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top