Over the past few years I have become a fan of the Peer-to-Peer car rental site TURO. Back in Sept I started shopping for rental cars for this Hawaii trip. Got a killer deal for our 2 weeks in Maui via Hotwire to Alamo - about $20 a day. But for the Big Island part of the trip, which spans Christman and New Years Eve, the prices were terrible, starting around $85 a day! So I did some Turn shopping and landed a pretty good deal on a Prius, I forget the exact price, but it doesn't matter because within 24 hour the owner/renter cancelled the deal, probably realzing that they had giving a "normal rate deal" for the holiday season. So, I went back to searching and did finally end up with a fair deal. I communicated with the owner/renter and all sounded great. Back in Sept we left it at, "we'll get back in touch when the trip gets nearer. So this morning I sent her a text; within an hour I go a reply say that she had to CANCEL our reservation. WHAT THE ........! I then spent an hour on the photo with TURO, getting lots of sympathy, but ultimately NO CAR. To get a car with them right now would cost 2 1/2 time what I originally paid. So Nanqi started looking for deals online as I was chatting with the TURO folks and did find a car. But we are now booking last minute, before a holiday week....imagine that, it is a bit PRICEY. 

The outcome of all this will likely be less endorsement of TURO on my part in the future. I am generally a big fan of the growing Peer-to-Peer economy (think eBay, Uber, etc), but this lesson today may make me a bit more reluctant to choose individuals over corporations when it come to decisions of cost and convenience.