Borrow, Rent, Buy and Lend with Your Neighborhood

Name: NeighborGoods

Quick Pitch: Why buy when you can borrow? Save money and resources by sharing with your friends and neighbors on this online community.

Genius Idea: You know how Polonius was all, “Neither a borrower nor a lender be,” in Hamlet? Well, homeboy wasn’t weathering recession times. Unless you’re a total Spartan, you probably have a ton of stuff piled up in your closet that you hardly ever use. Conversely, you most likely find yourself in need of a hammer or sleeping bag every once and while — yet you’re reluctant to shell out the cash because, well, remember all that stuff stacked in your closet? That’s where NeighborGoods comes in.

NeighborGoods is a kind of social networking site for borrowing and lending. Like Craigslist, Freecycle and a bevy of other online classifieds sites, NeighborGoods allows users to browse and post information about goods they want/could stand to part with for awhile. Still, rather than being a bare-bones posting destination, the site allows users to create profiles for added personalization. Users can then search for goods in their neighborhood and connect with other users who have what they require. You can choose to rent, buy, borrow or score for free (or rent out, purchase, lend or give away). When you find something you dig, just fill out the online form, which looks like this:

Moreover, you can connect the site to your Facebook, Twitter and OpenID accounts, allowing you to broadcast your need for a hammer or your desire to rent out your fixie to your social network. Also, much like eBay, the site seeks to give its users an added sense of security by featuring user ratings. It also features transaction histories, deposits, and automated calendars and reminders to make sure you get your stuff back (and a panic button you can push that alerts the site when someone’s holding your stuff ransom).

You can also choose who can access your listings — friends, the whole community or only verified members. The verification process adds a sense of security, and allows users to see more listings. Basically you verify your account via PayPal (for $4.99 — which explains how the site makes money) and the site sends you a welcome kit including a verification code via snail mail. You enter this code into your profile and thereby receive the stamp of approval.

We’re still not sure how the site plans on ensuring that you’re not murdered upon arrival, but we figure that’s always a worry when dealing with strangers (Craigslist has had its own share of woes in that department).

Up until today, NeighborGoods was going through a testing period in Los Angeles, but after making an account for myself and adding my own listing (anyone wanna borrow a beat-to-hell acoustic guitar?), I found a goodly amount of postings near Brooklyn for stuff I would actually borrow/buy/rent. You can also join groups to better pinpoint your search — although, there’s only one other person in the “Williamsburg” group at present.

We’re into the idea of saving ourselves and our neighbors money — the site keeps track of just how much you hold onto/save your friends as well — so as NeighborGoods continues to grow and expand, perhaps we’ll hit you up for a cup of sugar.

image courtesy of iStockphoto, StuartDuncanSmith

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