A Sutherland Shire family that saved $20,000 is only seven months hopes to inspire others to take a leaf from their smart money handling experience.
Their story comes during Global Sharing Week, which celebrates the adoption of the 'sharing economy.' Thanks to the way it is helping revolutionise the way people live and work, leading sharing economy platforms of The Sharing Hub, such as The Volte, Camplify, Mad Paws and Spacer have at least doubled their users in 2018 and have all experienced exponential growth.
Australia's sharing economy is booming, with startup accelerator, The Sharing Hub, revealing last year that 36 per cent of Australians were actively participating in at least one platform.
One in 10 Australians earn about $1100 per month with the sharing economy and 70 per cent of earners use the sharing economy to help supplement their income on top of their employment. They use the money to help ends meet by paying bills (32 epr cent), putting towards a vacation (22 per cent) and paying off debt (19 per cent).
As huge fans of the great Aussie outdoors, Mark and Belinda have always liked the idea of embarking on caravanning trips with their three children.
When researching different recreational vehicles to purchase, they began to recognise Australia's thriving outdoor industry and business opportunities emerge with the arrival of a new golden era for caravans.
In winter 2017, they decided to explore opportunities to boost their income by hiring their family caravan a while balancing parenthood and their jobs - Mark as a firefighter and landscaper and Belinda in real estate.
Fast forward 12 months and they linked their business to the Camplify network which saw the family's caravan side hustle increase considerably, and enabled them to invest in another caravan to further expand their offshoot business, VanGo Caravan Hire. Since listing their second vehicle on Camplify in October 2018, the family has already secured over $20,000 in bookings in seven months.
"We absolutely love being able to offer more people the chance to experience the joys and freedom of a caravanning lifestyle," Mark said.
"Whether it's families, couples or retirees, we've met and really enjoyed helping our hirers set off on new adventures to explore the many wonders that Australia has to offer."
Belinda said the new caravan has been so popular the family are yet to experience their own family holiday in it.
"We're thrilled with the steady flow of bookings and hire income we've been able to earn with Camplify," she said.
"At first we were a little nervous about hiring our caravan, but after learning more about Camplify's comprehensive insurance and meeting our first hirer, we've not looked back.
"We're excited to continue building our side hustle in the caravan share economy, and hope to eventually increase out fleet to 10 vans."
