We have been leasing a Xerox Document Center 535 and will soon be ending the lease in October of this year.  Naturally, Xerox has already contacted us about upgrading/renewing.  Your comments about lease versus purchase were interesting and I wondered what your thoughts might be in this area.  Over the lease period, we've paid $460/month (60 months) which is a healthy amount, but affordable.  It's been a good machine, rarely needs service, etc.  We use it heavily, however we hardly ever go over our allotment on copies.  We probably average around 7,000 copies a month.  In addition to regular copying, a staff of 8 people use it as their primary printer via our network.

 Thanks very much.

Stan Piercefield, Hoosier Harvest Church, Martinsville, IN

Stan,

As I stated in the workshop I'm not a finance expert. But let's look at the math. You've spent $27,600 for your current machine over the last 5 years. Our office purchased a Sharp AR-M45 about three years ago for just over $10,000. It's comparable to the Xerox - actually it's 45 copies per minute versus 35. We pay $.012 per impression for monthly service - in your case that would be $84. So, my calculations show a total cost to own the machine would be a little over $15,000 ($10K purchase, $5000 maintenance) for five years. It seems to me you'd be better off purchasing or even using traditional financing rather than leasing!

Aaron