Like a scene from a James Bond movie, Anna Hobbs sinks into the plush cream leather of her gleaming Aston Martin as her new Fendi bag jostles for room with a D&G gold leaf bracelet.
It’s a show- stopping scene, not least because most of us are tightening our belts as the credit crunch bites.
Boring though it may be to keep harping on about the rising price of petrol, food and utility bills, the fact is that such mounting costs are leaving a big dent in the disposable income many of us have grown used to.
So what’s a girl to do to maintain her lifestyle without running up huge debts?
While Anna, 37, a marketing director, has a £70,000-a-year salary, her fabulousness is not all it seems.
Her income certainly does not stretch to the £900 designer handbag, the dreamy £110,000 sports car or the glittering bracelet.
Her secret? Like a growing number of women, Anna simply rents her A-list status. She is a tenant of a life she aspires to, yet can’t afford outright.
But renting means she gets to change its components to suit her mood, keep pace with the latest trends - and impress a date.
“I’ve splashed out hundreds of pounds on designer handbags in the past, but within months they’re past their fashion sell-by date,” she says.
I change my bag as often as I change my underwear
“When I heard of companies renting out such bags for less than the cost of a bottle of champagne, it was a no-brainer. It saves me a fortune and means I get to change my handbags almost as often as I change my underwear.
“The same goes for cars. OK, so it costs me my annual work bonus of £10,000 for just 40 days at the wheel of an amazing car, but how else would I get to drive something worth ten times that price?”
Anna is far from alone in her desire for experience over ownership, preferring to rent the things a girl’s heart desires for a fraction of their full designer price tag.
And lots of companies are offering rental schemes on everything from £1,000 bags to £50 million yachts, diamond jewellery, £160,000 sports cars, sumptuous holiday homes and couture evening gowns.
You can even rent your own private make-up artist, because good grooming is a must if you are starring in your own red carpet lifestyle.
Newcomers to the idea of hiring a lavish life could be forgiven for thinking it’s too good to be true. But there really isn’t a catch.
Since husband-and-wife team James and Jo Trafford set up Handbag Hire HQ last autumn, they’ve seen membership rocket from three in its first week to more than 4,000. And it’s easy to see why.
For the princely sum of £7.50 a month, members get to peruse an expanding online array of designer handbags - most worth between £500 and £1,000.
Then they simply pay a fee of between £10 and £35, depending on the value of the bag, to rent it for a week.
‘We’ve spent more than £60,000 on bags so far to cater for a varied client base, including women wanting a handbag for a special occasion and those intent on making a statement in the boardroom,’ says Jo.
A £900 handbag for £40 a week
Keeping up with the (Bridget) Joneses isn’t enough for a generation who, bombarded by the cult of celebrity, aspire to their own millionaire lifestyle. And Jo knows it.
Her members want to be the ones with the latest bag while their friends are still dreaming of the day they might be able to afford to buy one.
Amanda Zuydervelt, 31, is owner and editor of www.stylebible.com, a luxury lifestyle and concierge directory listing many of the companies offering lifestyles for hire.
“For most women, the £900 price-tag of the latest Chloe handbag is out of reach, but £40 a week to hire one definitely isn’t,” she says.
“At the other end of the scale are women who might earn £500,000 a year in the City, but don’t want to spend £150,000 of their salary on a Ferrari when they can join one of the many companies offering such luxuries for a fraction of the price and still get all the kudos that goes with it.”
This is exactly the reason why companies such as ecurie25 are attracting hoards of style-conscious women ready to trade fantasies of themselves cruising the open roads in an amazing car for the real thing.
Co-owner Flora Heathcote says: ‘Buying an annual membership of ecurie25 costs £10,750, which might sound a lot but it gives you access to around 40 days a year driving the finest cars on the planet with none of the hassles of outright ownership.
“It includes insurance, servicing, depreciation, valeting and maintenance. Not bad considering most of our cars have a price tag of at least £100,000 and cost more than £20,000 a year to run.
“But the best bit is that you get to choose from a £2 million fleet of wheels that would leave David Beckham longing. Our cars include the Lamborghini Murcielago, Aston Martin Vantage Roadster, Audi R8 and Ferrari F430 Spider F1.
“Members get to live the highway high life driving around in cars they could only dream of owning. And for most of them image is everything. Now they don’t have to pay through the nose for it.
Hire a car for a hot date
“Many hire a car if they’re going on a hot date or to an important event where they really want to make an impact.”
No doubt the same women poring over the latest Ferrari would also love the aptly named Affordable Millionaire, a business offering limited shares in chic overseas properties - a must for an A-list wannabe on a budget.
Karen Kenneby launched the company in 2005 with the aim of giving people the opportunity to snap up their own little slice of a lifestyle they couldn’t afford.
“We offer 13 shares in most of our properties because that means each owner can use the property for four weeks a year,” she says.
“Buyers have to be members of Affordable Millionaire. They then pay one 13th of the total price of the property, which keeps it affordable and if they decide to sell their share, they pocket any profits if the property has increased in value.”
Karen is offering would-be millionaires a share in plush apartments in Dubai and Paris for £7,000 and £300,000 respectively. And she is deluged with women desperate to snap up their own slice of a Sex And The City lifestyle with shares in a luxury apartment in Trump International Towers in Manhattan at £160,000 each.
“What lifestyle-conscious woman would not want to stop a conversation by announcing she has an apartment in New York, without having to admit she doesn’t own all of it?” she says.
You could be forgiven for assuming that a girl with a rented Prada bag on her shoulder, the keys to a hired Bentley Continental in her hand and a weekend in her fractionally owned New York apartment to look forward to wouldn’t want for anything else.
Designer labels without designer prices
But you’d be wrong. Diamonds are, after all, a girl’s best friend, and even more so when she can borrow them for next to nothing.
Sophie Garrett advertises a stunning £10,000 emerald and diamond ring for rent on her website www.yours2share.com
“I wear the ring only a handful of times a year and it seems a shame for something so beautiful to spend most of its time locked in a safe,” she says.
“So I’m offering other women the chance to hire it and dazzle their peers. It’s not dissimilar to an emerald and diamond ring owned by Victoria Beckham.”
Jenny Pearson recently launched www.hotrockshire.co.uk offering a huge range of upmarket and funky costume and semi-precious jewellery for rent.
“A couple of years ago I was shopping for an outfit for a party and saw the most fantastic necklace, but it was £300,” she says.
“Could I afford it? Well, yes, but the question I kept asking myself was whether I could really justify spending it on yet another piece of jewellery that I’d wear just a couple of times.”
And that was the inspiration behind Jenny’s jewellery hire website, which offers the opportunity to buy membership at £50 per year or £7.50 per month and then rental on an individual basis, or to rent on a one-off basis at a higher rate.
Meanwhile, girls are stocking up on designer labels without the guilt of designer prices by visiting boutiques such as The Dresser in West London, where stylists, socialites and fashion editors ditch their high- end purchases after a few outings.
They are sold on at significantly reduced prices, meaning ordinary mortals get to parade in current, or at the oldest, last season’s collection from designers such as Stella McCartney or Cavalli for little more than High Street prices. And who’s to know?
Sadly, though, our intrepid A-list lifestyle tenants will still have to dig into their pockets for suitable shoes.
Hygiene concerns mean our favourite heels are the only ingredient of a designer lifestyle not available for rent.
But what you save by hiring the rest of your red- carpet ensemble will surely pay for a pair of Christian Louboutin’s finest to call your own - credit crunch or not.
