’Best Buy’s ’Upgrade+’ Program Lets Customers Get a New Mac Laptop Every Three Years With Monthly Financing’
Eric Slivka, writing for MacRumors:
As an example, Best Buy cites a base M1 MacBook Air priced at $999.99. Through the Upgrade+ program, a customer can pay $19.99 per month for 36 months toward the machine. At the end of 36 months, the user has the option to make the remaining $280.35 payment and keep the machine, return the machine and leave the program, or upgrade to a new Mac laptop. If they return the machine, either to leave the program or upgrade to a new Mac, no final payment is required.
Wow! You can use a Mac for three full years, and then return it having paid less than the retail price (or re-up and get a brand new laptop). I suppose that’s how almost all leases work, but this strikes me as a particularly good deal for folks who are already on a regular upgrade cycle. Kudos to Best Buy for beating Apple to a non-iPhone hardware upgrade program, but, with everything they’re doing in the finance space these days, my gut says we’ll see a first-party version from Apple soon enough.