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Comment by 01100011 | Hacker News Reader

I leased my Bolt. I figured I would buy it out when the lease expires unless current EVs are competitive, but now, I don't know, maybe I'll just keep leasing. EVs feel less like buying a car and more like buying a really expensive PC in that the minute you buy it, it already seems somewhat outdated.

Sure, you can get that feeling with an IC car, but IME the updates are less frequent and the technology is more mature. My '17 Subaru feels a bit dated, but that's nothing I couldn't fix with a simple head unit upgrade.

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Leasing unless the manufacturer is doing something weird to hit quotas is equivalent to financing the car for 3 years and then selling it, so there aren’t big financial advantages one way or another, with financing giving you more flexibility.

Definitely you get more flexibility when financing, which is good if you like to keep cars a long time, or a short time. The latter being a surprisingly common situation. Some people figure a lease is a good way to have new cars pretty often, but don't realize that 3 years is still a fairly long time if you are a car spaz.

It's nice, though, to pre-negotiate the end of the ownership experience, selling cars to private individuals is frequently a great big hassle and trading in is a great way to spend several thousand extra dollars just to avoid that hassle.

Not quite.

Leasing lets me know what the car will cost me up front and I can decide based on those facts.

Buying exposes me to the whims of the resale market when I decide to sell. I also have to deal with the distraction of actually selling the car. If I want to maximize my return, that means private party sales, which means exposing myself to potential fraud and unbounded hassles with potential sellers.

I am generally not a fan of leases but I think they make sense with the changing EV landscape.

When leasing, do you have to be extra-careful with not dirtying/brushing/hitting the exterior or interior? The whole experience of owning is having much less to worry about being “told off by the parents” when you give it back.

Wear and tear is expected. If you get in an accident, you have it repaired just like you would if you owned it. If you beat it to hell then you can expect an adjustment to the value, just as if you tried to sell your own car after treating it that way. As long as it doesn't have collision damage, tires that are bald to unsafe levels, or a trashed interior, the guy at the dealer you hand the keys to is unlikely to care (it's not like the dealer owns it). They're just going to ship it off to auction and the detailers will clean it up and resell it.

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