OWNING a driveway in London has become like having a licence to print money for some big city residents.
Sub letting to cash-strapped commuters – who need to avoid crippling parking charges – has been something of a boom for homeowners who do not use their drives in the day.
And not to be left out residents in Blackpool are jumping on the new rental bandwagon.
The resort was this week named the 49th most lucrative area in the UK for renting a driveway.
Analysis of 10,000 driveways, available at 6,500 locations, revealed Blackpool residents are earning up to £648 a year from commuters looking for cheap parking.
London unsurprisingly attracted the most lucrative rentals, with driveway prices topping £2,532 a year.
There are currently 22 listings for Blackpool on the yourparkingspace.com website.
Residents are renting their driveways on a yearly, quarterly, monthly, weekly and even a match day basis.
Founder of yourparkingspace.com Charles Cridland said: “As the credit crunch has bitten commuters are desperate to cut parking costs by renting driveways, and home owners are very keen to make money by renting their drive out.” Over the past 12 months we’d estimate that there have been 120 rentals in Blackpool.”
And driveways aren’t the only parking residents are cashing in on with garages attracting rentals of £100 per month.
Nicola Dickinson, 38, currently rents her garage near Stanley Park, Blackpool, for £50 per month. She said “I don’t drive so I don’t use the garage. I had a look on the internet about renting it out and put it on yourparkingspace.com.”
Nicola has rented her garage for storage of paperwork, a valuable car and currently two motor bikes.
The busy Mum of three added “I have a low income and it’s proved really profitable for me.
“I could have rented the garage ten times over, I always have loads of people email me about it”.