Garage equipment finance

If you want to finance garage equipment, there are a few different options to explore. These include:

Leasing

Leasing is the most common form of asset finance. It means you rent your chosen equipment from a leasing firm or vendor over a set term. You then make regular (usually monthly) payments to the leasing firm. These payments are fixed, meaning you can budget your cash flow more effectively. Many lease agreements also include maintenance costs. 

At the end of the term, you can typically choose to extend the lease, return the equipment to the leasing company, upgrade the equipment, or buy the equipment outright.  

You can usually lease equipment for terms of between one and five years, but this can be longer. However, while it can enable you to acquire equipment you might have otherwise struggled to pay for, keep in mind that it can work out to be more expensive overall due to the interest and fees that are usually applied. 

In some cases, you might come across an operating lease. This is an agreement to rent garage equipment for the short to medium term. If you sign up to this, the leasing firm retains ownership of the equipment and you then pay a monthly fee to rent the equipment for a limited time. At the end of the lease term, you can choose to either return the equipment or renew the lease. This might work for you if you plan to upgrade equipment on a regular basis. 

Asset refinance

If you already own some garage equipment, it’s possible to use this equipment as security against a loan. This means you effectively access the value of this asset and can spend the money where you need to – whether you’re looking to refurbish your garage or carry out some essential maintenance work on your equipment. The advantage of this is that because the lender has a form of security, this type of loan can be cheaper compared to other forms of borrowing. The downside is that if you fail to repay the loan (plus interest) on time, the lender has the right to sell the equipment to recoup its money. But if you do pay back the loan in full and on time, the asset is usually returned to you. 

Buy now pay later

Some vendors might also offer an option to pay for garage equipment in short instalments – this is often known as buy now, pay later (BNPL). However, this is generally for limited companies only and you’ll typically need to be able to afford to split your purchase into three equal, interest-free payments, over a short time frame. For this reason, it’s more suited to smaller, less expensive purchases, such as diagnostic tools or EV chargers. There’s usually a minimum amount you must spend, but you can usually pay up early without triggering an early repayment charge.