Access-based consumption and renting are presented in the literature as potentially major contributor to circular economy and sustainable consumption, especially for technological products. However, investigation on consumers’ motivations and reluctance towards renting has been limited. This study aims to determine how (non)-ownership and environmental issues influence consumers’ willingness to rent a phone instead of buying it. The conceptual model is developed, where representations of renting, materialism and hoarding tendency, as well as perceived consumer effectiveness related to the environment, and environmental usefulness of renting influence the decision to rent instead of buy a technological product. A quantitative study was conducted on 1261 French respondents. Results reveals that both general and specific perceived consumer effectiveness lead to choose renting, while the appropriation concerns and the success dimension of materialism lead to prefer buying. Environmental usefulness of renting and perceived consumer effectiveness cannot discriminate between renting and renting with explicit mention of product recirculation. On the contrary, the success dimension of materialism and sentimental hoarding tendency reduce the willingness to rent when circularity is explicit.