With the cost of living continuing to squeeze household budgets, it’s no surprise that a growing number of Brits are turning to creative side hustles to supplement their income. And one clever and increasingly popular option? Renting out your driveway for a bit of extra cash on the side.
Not only can having off-street parking add between 5% and 10% to the value of your home, but it can also offer a steady stream of passive income. And with an estimated 30% of UK adults now running a side hustle, it’s clear the appetite for flexible earning is stronger than ever!
From properties near stadiums to homes in tourist-heavy cities, demand for private parking is growing. So, to explore this trend, the team at Leasing Options analysed data from platforms like JustPark and YourParkingSpace to reveal which UK postcodes and cities have the biggest driveway earning potential – and how major 2025 events could drive up earnings even more.
Here's what we discovered!
The top UK cities and postcodes for parking income
When it comes to renting your parking space, location is everything – after all, you won’t make much if you’re based in an out-of-the-way area. Thus, it’s perhaps unsurprising that London tops the leaderboard!
Homeowners in the capital can earn an average of £13.23 per day renting out their car parking spot, and potentially racking up over £4,827 a year just from renting out a single space.
Overall, our top 5 earning cities included:
- London – £13.23 daily / £4,827.45 yearly
- Brighton – £11.13 daily / £4,060.63 yearly
- Cardiff – £10.78 daily / £3,935.16 yearly
- Edinburgh – £10.73 daily / £3,916.15 yearly
- Glasgow – £10.52 daily / £3,839.26 yearly
Liverpool, Leeds, Croydon, Manchester, and Southampton also made the list and round off our top 10, showing that’s a wide geographical spread of areas where you can make your parking space pay.
However, while these cities certainly benefit from high tourism and commuter demand, earnings can vary significantly by postcode. Again, London dominates here, with West and South West postcodes offering standout returns!
For example, SW7 (South Kensington) offers daily earnings of £63, while W8 (Kensington) and SW5 (Earl’s Court) offer potential daily returns of £61.25 and £45 respectively. What this means is that, in just one day, someone in SW7 can earn nearly 70% of the UK daily minimum wage just by renting out their parking space!
In fact, the top UK postcodes in terms of earning potential offer a chance of making at least a quarter of the daily minimum wage in the UK from parking alone.
Top events for generating driveway income
While this kind of passive income is nice, if you’re lucky enough to live in an area where there are major events taking place, it can get even nicer. The data from our research shows that big-ticket events can send driveway demand soaring.
Whether it’s a concert, sports match or festival, homeowners near a stadium or ground can generate quick cash – sometimes making in a single day what they’d usually earn from driveway rental in a week.
To put this in perspective, here are the top-earning driveways in the UK in the last year for some of the country’s major events:
- Oasis – Manchester (Heaton Park) - £165.67
- Beyonce – London (Tottenham Hotspur Stadium) - £150.26
- Wimbledon Championships – Wimbledon (London) - £101.08
- Guns N’ Roses – Birmingham (Villa Park) - £97.40
- Sabrina Carpenter – London (Hyde Park) - £94.92
- Women’s Rugby World Cup – London (Twickenham Stadium) - £92.15
- British F1 Grand Prix – Silverstone - £69.41
- Lana Del Rey – Liverpool (Anfield) - £64.31
- Lana Del Rey – Cardiff (Principality Stadium) - £61.45
- Parklife Festival – Manchester (Heaton Park) - £60.62
The driveway earning potential for living near a stadium
Finally, in terms of making money from your parking space, you don’t necessarily have to wait for big-ticket events to roll into town. Living in close proximity to a stadium or sporting ground can provide opportunities for making money for large chunks of the year.
We’ve crunched the numbers, and these are the stadiums where parking is at such a premium that you might be able to take advantage of this with lower renting prices:
- Tottenham Hotspur Stadium – London – £22.25
- Elland Road – Leeds – £22
- Stamford Bridge – London – £21.50
- Wembley Stadium – London – £21
- Hampden Park – Glasgow – £21
- Cardiff City Stadium – Cardiff – £21
- OVO Arena Wembley – London – £21
- Marshall Arena – Milton Keynes – £15
- Anfield – Liverpool – £13
- Everton Stadium – £13
What to watch out for when renting your driveway
While renting your parking space is a relatively low-effort side hustle, there are a few things to consider before listing your space:
- Mortgage and lease rules – some mortgage or lease agreements may prohibit renting out your driveway, so always check the fine print rather than just chancing it.
- Insurance cover – if you want to rent your car spot, it’s best to get some public liability insurance in place to protect you in case of accidents or damage while someone is parked on your property.
- Tax implications – earnings from renting out your driveway do count as income. However, the UK’s Property Income Allowance lets you earn up to £1,000 each year before you have to pay tax. However, anything over that threshold must be declared to HMRC.
- Local council rules – in some councils, especially in London, you might need planning permission to rent out your front garden or a paved space.
- It must be yours – remember, you can only rent out private parking or driveways, and you can’t rent out public roads, even if it’s right outside your house.
What does all this mean for leasers?
Given the earning potential on offer here, this clever source of passive income is a great option if you’re someone leasing a car. And if you’re living in a city with limited parking, renting a space could offer a convenient and affordable alternative to extortionate hourly rates.
Going hand in hand with this, if you’re a homeowner, renting your space out might even help to cover the monthly payments of your personal car lease. In other words, it could be a win-win for you.
Mike Thompson, Chief Operating Officer at Leasing Options, sums it up perfectly:
“With more people looking at personal car leasing as an affordable and flexible alternative to buying, it makes sense to think differently about car ownership and usage. Renting out a driveway is a perfect example of how a little creative thinking can generate significant income – especially if you’re living in a high-demand postcode.”
And speaking of leasing a car, if you’re thinking about upgrading your personal transportation in the near future but can’t afford an entirely new car, then get in touch with the Leasing Options team today to how we can help you!
Methodology
To find the most profitable areas in the UK for renting out residential driveways, we analysed parking income across major cities and key 2025 events. We focused on 25+ major UK cities, selected for population, traffic, and venue density, and over 750 postcode districts were mapped using Wikipedia and public data.
We sourced full-day parking prices (6am–11pm) from JustPark, sampling weekdays and weekends throughout the year to capture seasonal trends. We also made sure to remove commercial listings by using keyword filters (e.g. “car park”, “multi-storey”), and location accuracy was ensured by only including listings where the title matched the postcode district – outliers were neutralised by using median prices.
From here, districts with fewer than five listings on both weekdays and weekends were excluded, leaving 550+ clean, reliable areas. We then averaged the median weekday and weekend price for each district to get a Daily Earning Potential, then averaged these across each city for rankings.
We also analysed multiple 2025 UK events, using JustPark data filtered by proximity. For multi-day events, listings were averaged across all dates to estimate typical event-day earnings.
