Abstract:
An Internet-based, computerized method and system enables renting real estate, furniture, and housewares in the same transaction. The same catalog of furniture and housewares is displayed to rental agents and to customers, but agents can see prices while customers cannot. System access is based on ranges of recognized Internet-protocol addresses. Thumbnail images link to enlarged pictures and lists of goods. Prices are totaled automatically, including tax. Agents place orders on-line. The system verifies the accuracy of orders and, if correct, returns a message that the order was placed successfully.

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     1. Field of the Invention 
     The present invention relates to managing rentals of personal property, and particularly, to an Internet-based method and system for renting furniture and housewares in connection with the rental of real estate. The invention is particularly suited for the high-volume, commercial real estate/rental industry. 
     2. Description of the Related Art 
     Real estate rental agents routinely rent furniture and household goods to customers who also rent apartments. “Real estate rental agents”, as used herein, refers to a residential property management company, a corporate housing company, or any other party who leases or arranges to lease real estate to another party. Residential property management companies typically lease real estate only, while corporate housing companies serve as consolidators in supplying bundled properties and services to corporations for short-term leases. A corporate housing company, for example, packages an apartment with furniture, housewares, and services such as cable TV, electric, Internet, and maid service. 
     The process of renting furniture and household goods for rental real estate is largely manual, labor intensive, and rife with errors. A typical transaction begins when a prospective real estate occupant expresses to a real estate rental agent an interest in renting real estate with accompanying rental furnishings and housewares. The real estate rental agent must then place a phone call to a furniture and housewares supplier. The person taking the order consults paper catalogs of household furnishings as well as paper copies of price listings in order to inform the real estate rental agent of the price for renting the desired items. Because the process is manual and especially complex when demand is high, human error can occur so that prices are routinely quoted wrong and totaled wrong. 
     When agents fax orders to suppliers, they must also phone the supplier to confirm that the fax was received and to verify the specifics of the order. Otherwise, suppliers must confirm the agents&#39; orders by fax or by phone. The supplier often gives the rental agent a confirmation number over the phone, the agent writes down the number, and then the supplier and the agent may also enter the confirmation number into a computer. The offices of agents and suppliers are filled with stacks of faxes and manila folders containing order confirmations. Goods are misidentified and the wrong furniture and furnishings are delivered, often to the wrong address. Opportunities for errors abound, and mistakes are common. 
     The industry cries out for automation. Unfortunately, none of the prior art satisfies the need, as will be evident in the prior art cited below. Although other inventions use the Internet to rent property and household goods, none is designed for the commercial real estate-rental market, and none solves the multiple problems addressed by the present invention. 
     U.S. Publication No. 2002/0046213, published Apr. 18, 2002, discloses a method for managing rentals of real estate and personal property items over a data communications network. The invention is not designed for commercial use. Instead, it operates on a flea-market model. Individuals rent their own real estate and personal property. Nor can the Vinati invention maintain and manage catalogs of furniture and housewares provided by commercial suppliers. 
     U.S. Pat. No. 6,016,504, issued Jan. 18, 2000 to Arnold et al., discloses a design for a Web page that integrates multiple vendors into one shopping place. The invention is not designed for commercial use or for any rental market. The Arnold invention, like the Vinati invention, is designed for the general public. There is no way to display and maintain a catalog of rental goods. 
     U.S. Pat. No. 6,285,986, issued Sep. 4, 2001 to Christopher C. Andrews, discloses a method for interactive, automated registration, negotiation, and marketing for combining products and services from one or more vendors. The Andrews invention uses the Internet, but again, is intended for the general public, and cannot satisfy the needs of the commercial real estate-rental and corporate housing industry. Prices are shown directly to customers, and are not kept confidential. The Andrews invention contains no provision for order confirmation. 
     In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, access to a Web-based furniture catalog containing restricted information is controlled by Internet Protocol address recognition. Techniques for configuring access control based on Internet Protocol recognition are well-known in the art and described in numerous publications, including Stein, John F.,  How to Set Up and Maintain a Web Site  190–193. Massachusetts: Addison Wesley Longman, Inc., 1997 and Yeager, Nancy J. et al.,  Web Server Technology  284–286. San Francisco: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers Inc., 1996. 
     The present invention, by contrast, eliminates the manual process of renting real estate together with furniture and housewares, and meets an unfilled need in the industry. None of the above inventions and patents, taken either singly or in combination, is seen to describe the instant invention as claimed. Thus a business process for the rental of furniture and housewares solving the aforementioned problems is desired. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     The present invention is an automated system and method which can be used to facilitate transactions in which real estate rental agents must arrange to rent furniture and housewares for a prospective real estate occupant, typically as an adjunct or ancillary service to the rental of real property. A catalog displaying a rental supplier&#39;s furniture and housewares, organized and marketed as a suite of furnishings, is displayed on at least one Web site on the Internet. The catalog is organized with publicly accessible web pages connected by hyperlinks which present images and text which show and list each component of the various suites, so that lessees may browse the catalog to select a desired suite of furnishings, but does not include price or ordering information. The prospective lessee contacts the real estate agent by phone, e-mail, or other means, and indicates the suite of furnishings desired. The catalog also contains web pages which have access restricted only to authorized real estate agents, access to the restricted pages being controlled by the server through screening of the domain name or Internet Protocol address of the agent&#39;s client computer. The real estate agent accesses the restricted catalog pages on the web site, which contain the same content as the publicly accessible catalog pages, but which also provide price information and links for submitting service request forms and orders for furniture and housewares to the supplier by e-mail. The supplier confirms the order by e-mail. 
     Rental prices quoted on the restricted catalog pages usually reflect prices which the real estate agent charges the lessees. The amount the supplier charges the real estate agent is agreed upon in advance and is typically less than the quoted retail cost. The use of catalog pages with published price information provided by the supplier and the use of electronic mail for confirmation of orders reduces human errors which may occur in the leasing of furnishings ancillary to the rental of real property, as well as reducing the volume of paperwork and labor required. 
     Accordingly, it is a principal object of the invention to provide an automated method and system for renting furniture and household goods and providing related services in connection with the rental of real estate. 
     It is another object of the invention to reduce human error in pricing rental furniture and household goods by providing an electronic catalog of furniture suites having published prices fixed by the supplier of the suite, access to the published prices being restricted to authorized rental agents. 
     It is a further object of the invention to reduce paperwork associated with the rental of furniture and household goods by providing an electronic catalog having pages with furniture suites priced by the supplier(s) of the suites linked to an order form producing an e-mail order sent to the supplier and an e-mail confirmation of the order returned to the rental agent. 
     Still another object of the invention is to provide an electronic catalog of rental furniture and household goods having publicly accessible web pages with only text and images of the furniture and household goods for viewing by prospective lessees, and restricted access web pages showing the same text and images together with price information and order forms accessible only by rental agents. 
     It is another object of the invention to provide improved elements and arrangements thereof for the purposes described which is inexpensive, dependable and fully effective in accomplishing its intended purposes. 
     These and other objects of the present invention will become readily apparent upon further review of the following specification and drawings. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         FIG. 1  is a block diagram of a system on which the method of the present invention may be practiced. 
         FIG. 2  is a flow chart depicting the system&#39;s Internet Protocol validation process. 
         FIG. 3  is a block diagram of Web pages from the Web-based electronic catalog which are accessible to public users. 
         FIG. 4  is a block diagram of Web pages from the Web-based electronic catalog which are accessible only to authorized real estate agents. 
         FIG. 5  is a flow chart depicting the steps involved in placing an order. 
         FIG. 6  is a representative screen shot of the initial Web page from the Web-based electronic catalog which is accessible to public users. 
         FIG. 7  is a representative screen shot of a catalog page accessible to public users which displays a particular furniture collection. 
         FIG. 8  is a representative screen shot of an enlargement of the particular furniture collection that is displayed in  FIG. 7 . 
         FIG. 9  is a representative screen shot of a portion of a catalog page accessible to public users displaying housewares available for rent. 
         FIG. 10  is a representative screen shot of the supplier&#39;s initial electronic catalog page accessible only to authorized real estate agents. 
         FIG. 11  is a representative screen shot of a catalog page only accessible to authorized agents displaying a particular furniture collection. 
         FIG. 12  is a representative screen shot of a catalog page only accessible to authorized agents displaying exemplary housewares available for rent. 
         FIG. 13  is a continuation of the catalog page of  FIG. 12 . 
         FIG. 14  is a representative screen shot of a portion of an on-screen order page. 
         FIG. 15  is a continuation of the order page of  FIG. 14 . 
         FIG. 16  is a bottom portion of the order page of  FIG. 15 . 
         FIG. 17  is a fragmented screen shot of an order confirmation form Web page. 
         FIG. 18  is a representative screen shot of a pick-up request form. 
         FIG. 19  is a representative screen shot of a service request form. 
     
    
    
     Similar reference characters denote corresponding features consistently throughout the attached drawings. 
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT 
     The present invention is an automated rental system and method for facilitating rental of personal property items, in connection with rental of real estate. 
       FIG. 1  shows a representative system on which the method of the present invention may be practiced. As is shown in  FIG. 1 , the system  10  uses a client-server model, including a plurality of client computers  12  connected to a Web server  16  through a computer network, preferably the Internet  14 , although the computerized system  10  may also operate on an intranet or extranet. The Web server  16  has a processor  18  for processing instructions and an area of main memory  20  for executing program code under the direction of the processor  18  connected by a bus  24 . 
     The client computers  12  have a Web browser operable thereon for receiving and viewing documents transmitted over the Internet  14  via hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) by the Web server  16  and for transmitting requests for documents to the Web server  16  via HTTP. 
     The rental system  10  includes a web-based software program code. The software program code is stored on a computer readable medium which is operable in main memory  20  on the Web server  16  under direction of the processor  18  for managing rental of furniture and housewares, and is accessible to client computers  12  through the Internet  14 . As used in the present application, the term “computer readable medium” refers to a hard disk drive, a floppy diskette, a ZIP disk or any other magnetic storage media capable of storing media capable of storing coded program instructions, an optical or laser storage device, such as a compact disk, laser disk, paper tape, punch cards or any other media for the storage of program instructions readable by a disk storage device or reader. The computer code may be written in Java (Java is a trademark of Sun Microsystems), HTML, XML, Microsoft&#39;s active server pages (ASP), or any other suitable computer language. Scripting languages, such as JavaScript, may also be used. 
     The Web-based program code executes in the main memory  20  under the direction of the processor  18 , and includes Web server software which enables the system  10  to manage the rental of furniture and housewares on at least one Web site on the Internet  14 ; provide a Web-based catalog of furniture and housewares without prices for a prospective real estate occupant to view; provide a Web-based catalog of furniture and housewares with prices for a real estate rental agent to view; permit or deny access to a remote computer based on recognition of Internet Protocol addresses; allow a user to proceed from one Web page to another Web page by clicking on hypertext links; display thumbnail pictures of furniture; enlarge thumbnail pictures of furniture; display on-screen order forms in which orders for furniture, housewares, or related services may be placed; verify that order form is completed; calculate the total cost of an order, including tax; recalculate the total cost of an order if the ordering information has been changed; electronically send an order to a supplier; and electronically return a message to a real estate rental agent confirming that the order was placed successfully. 
     The rental system  10  is used to facilitate transactions involving rental of furniture and housewares in connection with rental of real estate. The system allows a supplier of furniture and housewares to display the supplier&#39;s rental furniture and housewares in an electronic catalog having both web pages accessible by the general public, and web pages accessibly only by authorized agents. The system  10  can be built to comply with a real estate rental agent&#39;s business rules and desired pricing structure. Preferably, the Web-based catalog will be incorporated into a real estate rental agent&#39;s existing Web site to facilitate a prospective real estate occupant&#39;s search for rental real estate, furniture and housewares. Only authorized users, i.e., a real estate rental agent with whom the supplier has made a previous agreement to lease furniture and housewares, may access the restricted web pages. Public users, such as prospective real estate occupants, only have access to the publicly accessible web pages. The publicly accessible web pages may be referred to herein as the “public catalog”, while the restricted pages may be referred to herein as the “private catalog”. While the private catalog is only accessible to authorized agents and the public catalog is accessible to public users, each may be accessed simultaneously on the same Web site by the different users. 
     As depicted in  FIG. 2 , the system can be designed to recognize an authorized agent based on the agent&#39;s Internet Protocol address, i.e., the domain name or Internet Protocol (IP) address of the machine used by the agent, according to programming techniques which are well-known in the art. This may be accomplished by storing the publicly accessible web pages and the restricted access web pages in separate directories and providing a configuration file which has been modified by the administrator of the web site to automatically provide access to the restricted directory for specified domain names or IP addresses, by associating an access key with the restricted files and appending the key to GET requests originating from specified domain names and IP addresses, or by any other programming method conventionally known in the art. Restricting access by identification of domain name or IP address has the advantage of freeing the web site from the necessity of maintaining user name and password files. The routine for validating Internet Protocols  28  determines whether the user is an authorized user at step  30 . If so, the user is granted access to the private catalog at step  34 , otherwise the user is granted access to the public catalog at step  32 . 
     A public user accessing the Web site will be directed to an initial Web page  36 , having links to other publicly accessible web pages, as depicted in the block diagram of  FIG. 3 . The web page  36  has a plurality of thumbnail pictures of furniture suites available for rental. Clicking on a picture  38  takes the user to a particular furniture collection page  40  where descriptive information on a particular furniture collection is provided. Hypertext links available on a furniture collection page  40  include, but are not limited to housewares  42 , optional items  44 , contact information  46 , and home  48  and allow the user to access other Web pages in the catalog. The housewares link  42  leads to Web pages displaying household items which are available for rent, including, but not limited to, dishware and linens, represented by selection 1  50  and selection 2  52 , respectively, in  FIG. 3 . The optional items link  44  takes the user to a Web page listing luxury household items. The contact information link  46  takes the user to a Web page which displays the contact information of the company running the web site. The home link  48  is a standard Web-page link that takes the user back to the initial Web page  36 . 
     After noting rental items of interest, a prospective lessee may contact the rental agent handling the rental of the real property to determine prices for the rental items of furniture and housewares for price information and/or to place an order. The contact may be by phone, in person, by facsimile, by e-mail, or by any other means. The lessee will advise the rental agent of the items of interest, and the rental agent will then access the restricted access pages of the electronic catalog for price and order information. 
     As discussed earlier, the system will automatically grant the authorized real estate agent access to the private catalog, based on Internet Protocol address recognition. A block diagram depicting Web pages in the private catalog is depicted in  FIG. 4 . As is shown, the private catalog includes the information provided in the public catalog as well as prices for rental items. Accordingly, the private catalog has an initial Web page  58 , or home page, with furniture collection thumbnail pictures  60 . Clicking one of the pictures will display a page  62  with the suite or collection which also includes prices. The collection pages  62  include links to pages for housewares  66 , optional items  68 , contacting the web site  70  and links  72  to return to the home page. The housewares page  66  shows a first selection with prices  74 , a second selection with prices  76 , etc., with a link to the order page  64 . The optional items page  68  includes a list with prices  78 , with a link to the order page  64 . The contact us page  70  lists the address and phone number  80  of the company running the web site. Additionally, the collection pages  62  have listed under types of services  63 , links for service request forms for pick-up of rental items  67  and other services  65 , as well as the order page  64  for placing orders for furniture and housewares. 
       FIG. 5  depicts the order entry process for furniture and housewares. The order entry process includes the steps of processing  82  information entered in the order page  64  by the authorized agent, updating  84  the price, calculating  86  the total price of all items ordered, electronically sending  88  the order page  64  to the supplier, and electronically returning  90  confirmation to the real estate agent that the order page  64  was submitted. The authorized agent has the option of changing the order and updating  84  the price again before the step  88  of sending the page  64 . In addition to posting a page confirming receipt of the order page  64 , the web site will package the order page  64  in an e-mail which is sent to the supplier, and will e-mail a copy of the order information to the agent. Upon receipt of the order page  64 , the supplier likewise will e-mail confirmation of receipt of the order page  64  to the agent. 
       FIGS. 6–9  depict representative examples of Web pages in the public catalog. It will be understood that the screen shots in the drawing Figures are shown in a MICROSOFT INTERNET EXPLORER window (MICROSOFT and INTERNET EXPLORER are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation); however, any browser may be used to practice the present invention.  FIG. 6  depicts an initial Web page  92  wherein thumbnail pictures  94  of the rental furniture are displayed. The authorized user clicks on one of the pictures  94  and is taken to a furniture collection Web page  96  which lists the details  98  of the particular furniture collection, as depicted in  FIG. 7 . Links to other Web pages for other furniture collections  100 , housewares  102 , optional items  104 , contact information  106 , and home  108 , are also provided. When the authorized user clicks on a picture  94  on the furniture collection page  96 , a pop-up, enlarged picture  110  is displayed, as depicted in  FIG. 8 . When the authorized user clicks on a housewares link  102 , a list of household items  116  is displayed, as depicted in  FIG. 9 . The household items  116  are categorized under room headings  114  designating the particular rooms in which the items may be used. Links to other Web pages for furniture collections  100 , housewares  102 , optional items  104 , contact information  106 , and home  108  are also provided as described for  FIG. 7 . 
       FIGS. 10–17  depict Web pages of the private catalog. The Web pages for the private catalog depicted in  FIGS. 10–13  are similar to those of the public catalog depicted in  FIGS. 6–9  except that rental price information  124 , an order page  132  and service request forms including, a pick-up request form  133  and other service request form  137 , are also provided. As shown in  FIG. 10 , the private catalog home page  118  includes image links  94  to the furniture suites and housewares collections offered as well as an order page link  120 . An exemplary furniture collection page  122  from the private catalog is shown in  FIG. 11 , which contains the same content as the publicly accessible page  96  of  FIG. 7  (except that the name(s) of the collection(s) shown in the illustrations have been altered; in practice they would be identical), but also includes price information  124 , pick-up request link  121 , other service request link  123 , and an order page link  120  for placing furniture and housewares orders. As with  FIG. 7 , links to the various collections, such as the “Corporate Collection”  200  of housewares, are provided. 
       FIGS. 12 and 13  depict the web page  128  shown when link  200  is selected as in the case of the furniture selection pages, the private catalog housewares page  128  has the same content as the corresponding public catalog page  112  of  FIG. 9  (again the name of the collection(s) have been altered in the illustrations, but would be identical in practice), but includes the same menu of links on the left side of the page as  FIG. 11 , and also includes price information  124 . 
     An exemplary order page  132  is depicted in  FIG. 14 . When the authorized user clicks on the order page link  120 , the on-screen order page  132  appears. The authorized user provides the appropriate order information in fields  134  of the order page  132 . 
       FIG. 15  depicts a continuation of the on-screen order page  132 . Once satisfied with the entries, the authorized user may click a price updating button  136 . The system first verifies that the order page  132  has been completed, then calculates the prices, adds tax if necessary, and provides a total cost of rental.  FIG. 16  depicts a partial view of the display which appears once the totals have been calculated. If the authorized user wishes to make any changes to the selections, the price updating button  136  may be clicked again to obtain a new set of  FIGS. 140 . The on-screen order page  132  can be electronically transmitted to the web site by clicking on the transmit button  138 . The system automatically provides a reply  142  with a message  144  indicating that the order page  132  has been submitted successfully as shown in  FIG. 17 . The web site transmits the order to the supplier by e-mail. The supplier may also manually send an additional electronic mail message confirmation attaching the order form  132  to confirm receipt of the order. 
       FIG. 18  depicts the pick-up request form  133 . The authorized user provides the required information in fields  134  of the pick-up request form  133  in order to schedule a time and date for the rental items to be reclaimed by the supplier. The pick-up request form  133  can be electronically transmitted to the supplier by clicking on the transmit button  138 . The procedure confirming receipt of the pick-up request form  133  is the same as that described for the order page  132 . 
       FIG. 19  depicts the “Other Service” request form  133 . The authorized user provides the required information in fields  134  of the other service request form  133  in order to request other services, including, but not limited to, houseware fluff, maid service, carpet cleaning, and furniture exchange. A drop down list box  139  is provided with a list of the various types of services available so that the authorized user may specify type of service desired. The other service request form  133  can be electronically transmitted to the supplier by clicking on the transmit button  138 . The procedure for confirming receipt of the other service request form  139  is the same as that described for the order page  132 . 
     The basic steps in a computerized method for rental of furniture and housewares comprise the following steps: publishing a web site on the Internet having an electronic catalog of furniture suites and housewares collections for rent by at least one supplier, the catalog having publicly accessible web pages containing only images and text describing the suites and collections, and having restricted access web pages having the same content as the publicly accessible pages and further including price information and an order form accessible through a hypertext link; registering authorized rental agent users by domain name and IP address; screening GET requests by domain name and IP address; receiving a GET request for a catalog web page; automatically displaying the publicly accessible web pages when the GET request originates from a domain name and IP address which has not been registered; automatically displaying the restricted access pages when the GET request originates from one of the authorized users; receiving a completed order form from at least one of the authorized rental agent users; sending an electronic mail message confirming receipt of the completed order form to said at least one of the authorized rental agent users; and sending a copy of the completed order form to the at least one supplier by electronic mail. 
     It is to be understood that the present invention is not limited to the embodiment described above, but encompasses any and all embodiments within the scope of the following claims.