> "and I don't want to pay a price that is pretty close to what it would cost to just buy the tool!"

Why not pay the full price for the tool + delivery (handled by some monthly membership fee, maybe) to keep it as long as you like, and then push a button on your phone and someone shows up from the service to "buy it back" and return it to the cloud. You'd essentially be paying a deposit to cover the item, and then get the money back when the service got it back.

I'd liken this more to the original "netflix-for-everything", with a dash of exec/uber-for-everything.