As most of you know, my brother and I got kicked off Turo after about three and a half to four years on the platform, and we were one of the biggest hosts—making millions—yet we still never got a reason. We literally got an email saying we’re no longer allowed to rent, with zero explanation. That moment just reinforced what I’ve been saying forever: you can’t put all your eggs in one basket, because platforms can kick you off at any point for whatever reason, and you’re stuck holding the bag. The scary part is thinking about the hosts who don’t have a backup plan. We had around 200 cars at the time, and if we weren’t already doing private rentals, we would’ve been screwed. I’ve been seeing a spree of bans lately—people with hundreds of cars and people with 10–20 cars—so this isn’t just a “big host” problem. What saved us was transitioning fast and going aggressive on marketing: we went from about $1,000/month in ads to $30,000/month, took a utilization hit, probably wasted some money early, but we rebuilt demand and climbed back to consistent 85–90% utilization. Getting banned ended up being a blessing in disguise because it forced us to build a real company that isn’t reliant on a platform for leads.