Turo User Attracts Chicago's Wrath After Street-Parking 38 Cars
A man in the US city of Chicago is locked in a legal battle with authorities over his operation of a large-scale Turo-based car rental operation out of his home.
Michael Oates amassed a fleet of 38 mostly cheap, ordinary cars over a two-to-three-year period and simply parked them on the street at his home address, usually in front of neighbours’ houses. Nothing illegal in that, perhaps, but it’s anti-social at the least.
Residents of his suburban neighbourhood began to notice how extreme the situation had become back in December 2017, eventually complaining to the 46th Ward’s local Alderman – kind of like a long-serving councillor.
Alderman James Cappleman was furious. He said parking had become the number one issue in the ward, which includes Buena Park and Uptown. While he couldn’t pull Oates up over the parking, since all his cars have the correct permits, Cappleman believes Oates is operating a car rental business out of his apartment – something illegal in Chicago.
Since then the legal wrangling has become messy. Since Turo accounts aren’t legally classed as being car rental businesses, Oates’ activities – which are ongoing – aren’t covered by existing law. Legislators would have to pass a new law to stop private individuals like Oates from amassing large fleets of cars while dodging the responsibilities and expenses of a large rental operator. Lawmakers are due to make a ruling soon.
Turo itself doesn’t want to know, calling Oates and his ilk ‘outliers’ in the system and claiming that large fleets would be financially better off switching to a conventional rental business model anyway.
At the time of writing Oates still has 37 cars available on Turo, ranging from numerous Toyota Yaris, Prius, Camrys and Corollas to a handful of Volkswagen Jettas and Ford Escapes. The cheapest day rate is $20, rising to $99 for a high-spec red Jetta.
Source: Jalopnik
Comments
How about Doug DeMuro goes down there to review their quirks and features?
Haha! That would be hilarious! 🤣
I wonder if this is what Doug DeMuro dreams of……
These are mostly boring cars tho
I think it’s cool you still have ealdormen in the US. Your saxon heritage isn’t dead yet!
I’d take some of those Jettas if they get seized.
…without their front brake disks
How is the jetta 99 dollars per day?
Where does it say you can’t park X number of cars on a street?
It’s his property, yeah, it’s a douche move, but how is it against the law?
It isn’t. The neighbors just don’t like having his fleet of cars in front of their houses
As long as he is not a scammer, whats the problem? He is a individual with a large range of cars he owns, who wishes to profit of them.
Ehh state laws are like that sometimes. Some laws, nobody knows why it’s there.
Do you honestly don’t understand why it’s a problem that somebody is occupying 38 public parking spaces all on his own? That’s just selfish; if you have this many cars, then you have to have the means to store them. The public parking spaces are there for everybody, not just for one person who thinks he can use them all for his own rental fleet.
well, taking up the entire parking spaces from everybody in the neighborhood is an action from a f*cking selfish @$$hole. Enough said.
Charging 4x more for a Jetta, I have little simpathy for him
This idea of “The law doesn’t say I can’t” is a huge problem here in America. Normal individuals and large corporations alike find loopholes in state and federal laws and exploit them. For example, a few years ago, there was a huge problem with landlords evicting tenants so they could rent them out on Air B&B. There are laws against vacation rentals for landlords but nothing about using a 3rd parties connections for short term rentals. This seems like a very similar situation and I hope this man is forced to pay for parking of his fleet just like any normal business in America would have to.
LOL