DIY Toolshare

DIY Toolshare, tool rental between neighbours in the UK

DIY Toolshare is a British sharing-economy platform focused on peer-to-peer DIY tool rental. Its proposition is that anyone who needs equipment for a one-off job rents it from a neighbour instead of buying it, and that anyone with underused tools lists them for rent to earn income. The company operates under DIY Toolshare Ltd.

The service is live across London, Essex and several Home Counties around the capital, with plans to open new UK areas. The platform allows users to vote for their postcode to request the service in a specific area and join a waitlist, as well as offering early access to those who want to register as lenders.

How renting works

The process has three steps: search for tools available in your area or for a specific item, book dates with payment through the platform, and collect the equipment for use and return within the agreed timeframe. Search prioritises a radius of about 5 miles and only widens when necessary; the company states that rentals are usually made to verified neighbours within a 5 to 10 mile radius.

If you can't find what you're looking for, you can post a wish-list and receive alerts when the item becomes available. According to the platform itself, guide prices are typically 6% to 10% of the retail price, which the company presents as a cheaper alternative to buying for one-off jobs.

Catalogue and guide prices

The catalogue is organised by tool type and covers 53 categories, including general DIY and home improvement (18 categories), carpentry and woodworking (4), garden and outdoor (10), cleaning and maintenance (6), building and masonry (13), plumbing and bathrooms (1) and automotive and garage (1).

The website shows guide daily prices for common tools, alongside the typical new purchase price:

• Hedge Trimmer: from £4/day (typical new price from £45).
• Pressure Washer: from £12/day (from £150).
• Angle Grinder: from £6/day (from £70).
• Jigsaw: from £8/day (from £90).
• Circular Saw: from £10/day (from £120).
• Mitre Saw: from £12/day (from £200).
• Strimmer: from £6/day (from £70).
• Step Ladder: from £8/day (from £80).
• Wheelbarrow: from £5/day (from £60).
• Pallet Truck: from £12/day (from £200).

The platform itself warns that these prices are guide prices and vary by brand and condition of the equipment.

For those lending their tools

Owners set their daily price freely, decide availability and choose who they lend to. The platform offers a listing assistant that, it says, lets you create a listing in under ten seconds, and an earnings calculator that estimates five popular tools could generate over £400 per month; in the example shown, £561 per month equals about £449 net after a 20% platform fee.

The protection system includes identity verification of borrowers before booking, payments managed entirely through the platform with payout to the lender at the time of return, two-way reviews, community rules and up to £500 cover per booking against accidental damage or theft, automatic and with no deposit required from the borrower.

Declared environmental impact

The company maintains that sharing tools avoids the manufacturing of new products and, with it, carbon emissions. To estimate this, it uses embodied carbon factors from the Inventory of Carbon & Energy (ICE) v3.0, produced by the University of Bath and Circular Ecology, applied to aluminium, steel and plastics, with a conservative component for electronics, and spreads the impact across about ten bookings over the lifetime of each tool.

Results are expressed in "tree-years", taking as a reference that a mature UK tree absorbs about 22 kg of CO₂ per year. Examples cited include an aluminium ladder (about 90 kg CO₂e, equivalent to 4 tree-years), a cordless drill (about 10 kg CO₂e, 0.5 tree-years) and a pressure washer (about 35 kg CO₂e, 1.6 tree-years). The company notes that figures are directional and that the main benefit comes from avoiding manufacturing, not from use or transport.

Company details

DIY Toolshare operates as DIY Toolshare Ltd, with company number 16526986 and VAT number GB 501 7911 17. The brand logo is a UK registered trade mark in the name of DIY Toolshare Ltd (UK00004282472).