Some background: I already started a company over a year ago, with the honest intention to try to make money in aviation (I had just started with the PPL training). By now I know what it takes to get an AOC, so rental is my only realistic alternative.
Because I was a company, I could buy a company car. As it's a luxury eco friendly car, I got about 30k euro cashback in tax and other benefits. If I would stop now, I have to pay back about 20k euro, and that's not something I want
So I'm honestly gonna try to make some money on a plane, and if after 4 or 5 years that's not feasible (my rental rate might be too much, too few customers, bad economy, etc), I can always stop trying and stop the company. By then I would no longer be obliged to pay back the environmental subsidy on my car, and it has deprecated for 95%.
For now I myself will be the biggest renter of the plane, followed by my wife, friends and colleagues who I will happily be flying around for free (no monetary reward for acting as a pilot). They just rent the plane from a company, and I'm even gonna share 25% of the rental cost with them (for a 4 seater) from my personal wallet so there is no mistake that I'm not invalidating the PPL. As I expect to make about 100 hours myself, I'm already closing in on the break-even point from a business perspective, so the company isn't loosing too much money.
And who knows, there might be people at the airfield who see my lovely plane and want to fly in it. If I know and trust them, I'm happy to let them rent it. Planes should be in the air, not on the ground.
Sometimes the picture is bigger than only just the plane. Regarding TLC, I think that's covered