Have you ever rented out your phone line. Bad idea?

[holden j caufield]

So I got a new phone at the beginning of the year from work. They're cool and said it's fine if I use it for personal use as long I don't exceed too much data. For the last 4 months I've been paying Tmobile $50 a month for unlimited minutes, unlimited text, and 2gb of data for no reason. But I also don't want to end my plan since it fits me nicely and if I come back to it I'm not sure I can get the same rate.

So is it a bad idea to rent out my line? And how exactly would be the safest way to do this? I feel I could be saving $500+ a year. Course I'd probably offer it to someone for $45.

 

[gmaster456]

A better question is why someone would want to rent a line for $45 a month when they can get their own for $50.

 

[holden j caufield]

good question, I had to pay a 2 yr contract. This way they don't need a contract. Maybe I need to lower my price.

 

[santz]

this is risky stuff... what if some one uses your phone for illegal purposes?
not worth the trouble i think, but thats your call

 

[gorcorps]

I've never even heard of anyone doing this. I would never trust a thing like this to a stranger. What kind of person would be looking for a number that is in no way tied to their name? Surely it would only be fine, upstanding citizens and not drug dealers...

 

[vshah]

good question, I had to pay a 2 yr contract. This way they don't need a contract. Maybe I need to lower my price.

t-mobile doesn't require contracts anymore, so no advantage there either. you'd be competing solely on price. also note this may be against tmobile TOS, you should check carefully.

 

[Red Storm]

I lent my cousin a phone & line once. Just changed the forwarding to his Google Voice number and he was good to go. I don't know if I would ever do that with a stranger though.

 

[RedRooster]

You pretty much have to try to sell that contract if you don't want to pay the early cancellation fee. It'd be like those "breakmylease" car websites where people want out of their leases and offer someone a couple thousand to take it over.
Your plan isn't special, so I wouldn't rent it out in case you want to keep it for the future. If you don't need it, just dump it.

 

[bonkers325]

it's a terrible idea. you're still going to pay $5 + tax on $50 for the duration of the contract, plus you'll have the associated risk of a complete stranger possibly burning all of your data and doing illegal things using YOUR phone number.