[jschveibinz]

This is a good question, but I don’t think this is analogous to AirBnB. A workspace is more of a long term thing rather than a day or two, and probably not in line with zoning or hoa restrictions. I wish that there were temperature controlled warehouses divided up into project spaces. I would rent one of those in a heartbeat.

[shoo]

Different types of work require specialised equipment and need different kinds of work space.

For a kind of work that's clearly not a great fit for renting out your house: a restaurant. Why exactly might it be a poor fit? Restaurant needs a good location, ideally with enough passing foot traffic of punters who are looking to dine out. The building needs specialised equipment, e.g. commercial kitchen, a place for the customers to dine, a toilet they can use. Interior likely needs to be decorated a bit. There will be various health and safety regulations that the space would need to comply with. In order to attract the custom of bunch of regulars, the restaurant needs to remain in the same place.

Trying to summarise & generalise -- what might be the downsides of renting a working space from someone's home?

* some specific kinds of workplaces are subject to additional regulation. getting the regulation may require making improvements/changes to the house and wrangling with bureaucracy

* probably not a good fit for businesses that need to attract lots of passing walk-in customers, or need a workplace that presents a veneer of a professionalism to build credibility when meeting customers

* probably not a good fit for businesses that need longer-term lease arrangements, or the _option_ of longer term lease arrangements

* probably not a good fit for businesses that need specialised equipment that needs to be lugged about

* probably not good fit for businesses that need to make physical changes to their workspace

What would the advantages be to the potential renter, compared to alternatives of longer-term commercial leases with more ability to customise workplace, or shorter-term more flexible leases in shared spaces dedicated to working? (e.g. co-working spaces that also rent access to photocopiers/reception/fancy address/meeting rooms; co-working hacker/maker spaces that also rent time-share access to expensive tools & machinery like cnc machines; ...)

[willbenito123]

So I think this would be for knowledge intensive workers, who can currently work from home if they want.

For businesses with big property and equipment costs I agree - you can't operate from a different location.

Luckily, the biggest and newest businesses are not machinery heavy (haven't seen anyone touch the photocopier in a while). Footfall etc are less of an issue - this only applies to the retail sector and frankly a smaller and smaller part of it!

[willbenito123]

I think that depends on what you do as a job. For some people a one day break in a new location could be stimulating and healthy.

Appreciate that for others its a different story. One way this could go is a week/two week room swap that includes accommodation AND a work space. That gets difficult for logistics though...