Why buy when you can rent?

INVESTING A LOT of money up front in tech that can only go down in value is reminiscent of buying a new car, and the finance industry has the same solution for both: lease it instead. With computers, though, this still isn’t generally a facility aimed at consumers. Apple’s business financing, for example, is only offered to companies and on purchases over $4,000 (see bit.ly/ml169appfnc).

There’s more flexibility with suppliers like CDW, a long–established IT leasing specialist and Apple Financing partner that offers two main types of plan (see cdw. com): Fair Market Value (FMV) or $1 Buy Out. The latter option offers a lower upfront cost with the ability to own the product outright at the end of the lease for just $1. The FMV plan has a lower upfront cost and lower monthly payments, with the option to hand back the equipment at the end of the lease or pay for the outstanding balance. The cost of the lease depends on a range of factors, although CDW quotes lease costs of $54.37 per month for a 27–inch iMac with Retina 5K display, 3GHz Intel Core i5 processor, 8GB of memory, and a 1TB of Fusion Drive. And it quotes $71.62 per month for a 16–inch MacBook Pro with a 2.6GHz Core i7 CPU, 16GB of memory, and 512GB of storage.

You’ll need to qualify as a business customer, usually based on your corporate credit score, which may be an issue for microbusinesses and freelancers — but CDW do have options to help startups qualify, so it’s worth asking. Search “Mac leasing” online for alternatives. Leasing costs more than buying, and there’s no obvious tax benefit (the payments are deductible, but you could write off the capital cost in the first year anyway). For cash flow, though, and as an alternative to borrowing with interest, it could make sense.