Almost everyone who has driven someone else's truck for long enough wants their own. That is understandable: an owned vehicle is something that remains. But in the first year the decision is not settled by what is left after five years. It is settled by whether you survive a month in which nothing went to plan.
Buying
You get an asset and complete freedom: no conditions, no lessor. The price is that all of the money leaves at once, right at the start — precisely when a buffer matters most.
After that, everything that happens to the vehicle is yours: major repairs, tyres, insurance, depreciation. The benefit of ownership is real, but it arrives late, while the costs arrive immediately.
Finance or leasing
The payment is spread and the start looks more affordable. The risk structure barely changes though: repairs are still yours, insurance is yours, residual value is yours, and on top come the interest and the obligation to pay in a month when you did not drive.
That last part is what breaks the first year most often — the instalment runs whether or not you stood idle, whatever the rate.
Renting
No asset is built. That is an honest downside and we are not pretending otherwise. What disappears is a whole class of risk: scheduled servicing, breakdowns, tyres and vehicle insurance are no longer your problem. Instead of a down payment there is a refundable deposit.
What stays yours either way: fuel, tolls and fines.
The three side by side
| Buying | Finance or leasing | Renting | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What leaves at the start | the whole price of the vehicle | the down payment | a refundable deposit and the first month's rent |
| An asset is created | yes, immediately | yes, but with a liability | no |
| Repairs and servicing | yours | yours | in the rate |
| Vehicle insurance | yours | yours | in the rate |
| Tyres | yours | yours | in the rate (wear) |
| A month with no loads | you pay nobody, but the truck loses value | the instalment runs on | the rent runs on |
| Fuel, tolls, fines | yours | yours | yours |
The numbers behind that last column are not a secret and you do not have to guess them. The deposit is one month's rent, and the rent differs per vehicle — 850 € for a Krone Profi Liner trailer, 2 200 € for a Ford F-MAX 500, 2 400 € for a MAN 18.520 and 2 550 € for an Actros 480 and a Volvo FH500. It sits next to each vehicle on Rent a tractor; what that rate covers and what it does not is set out in What the rental rate covers.
One thing about renting is worth working out in advance: two payments leave at the start, not one. The deposit, and a month's rent up front. For a Ford F-MAX 500 with a Krone Profi Liner that is 3 050 € of deposit and 3 050 € of rent — 6 100 € on the day you take the vehicle — of which the 3 050 € comes back within 30 days of the vehicle being returned, less any damage beyond normal wear. Against a down payment on finance, that is the difference that matters: a down payment is spent, a deposit is frozen.
How to compare honestly
Do not compare instalment with instalment. Compare what happens in a bad month: the vehicle in the workshop for a fortnight, one trip cancelled, one running back empty. Under finance you pay that month in full. Under a rental, part of that risk is simply not yours.
The actual figures are on What is left, where three different months are broken down line by line rather than averaged into one number.
