Sprint Lease Vs Buy
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sprint lease vs buy
In addition to the traditional methods of buying a lower-cost, subsidized smartphone in exchange for signing a two-year contract or paying off the full price of your device outright in the form of monthly installments, you can also lease your device from most carriers. Simply sign a lease deal, and in exchange for a low monthly payment, you get a phone you can use, plus the option to upgrade at any time. Just keep paying the flat monthly fee, and you can turn in your old phone for a new one every 12 months. One carrier even lets you swap phones up to three times per year.
You might think leasing and EIPs look similar, as both are built around monthly payments for a fixed term. There's one major difference, though: With an EIP, at the end of two years, you own your phone. Once the device is paid off, you can continue to use it with no additional monthly hardware costs, or you can sell your phone to finance a new model. With a lease, the monthly hardware costs are continual.
Those monthly payments tend to be lower for a lease agreement than with an EIP, just as they are usually lower over the short term when you rent instead of buy. In the case of phones, with an EIP, you pay a little more each month, because you're paying off the phone. For example, a 32GB Samsung Galaxy Note 5 from Sprint costs $25 a month if you lease it, but buying the phone via an EIP raises the monthly payment to $30.80. Trading in your current phone for a leased device can mean even lower monthly payments at some carriers, and the newer the phone, the lower the monthly payment.
And that's the primary appeal to leasing: Just pay a regular monthly fee in perpetuity, and you always get to show off the most current superphone. Most leasing deals let you update before the two-year lease is up. T-Mobile lets you update up to three times a year, for instance. Early update opportunities and costs vary wildly with EIPs, but most require you to wait at least six months or to pay off at least half the cost of your old phone before you can get a new one.
If you're in a lease, phone sellers figure you'll buy a phone more often and will be less likely to switch carriers or brands. "Carriers are in a never-ending quest to (a) keep their subscribers and (b) steal subscribers from everyone else," IDC's Llamas said. "Leasing plans like these are a way to do just that."
That's good for carriers and phone makers, but it may not be in the best interests of customers' wallets. Monthly lease payments that are lower than EIPs make it appear you are saving money. But this is a short-term illusion.
When you decide you want a new phone, you can sell your old one through outfits such as Gazelle, NextWorth or uSell to help finance the new one. With a lease, though, you just continue to pay month after month, year after year.
What's more, comparing one leasing deal to another is not as clear-cut as you might think, since leasing periods run for odd lengths. Apple's iPhone Upgrade Program has a lease period of 24 months (you can get a new phone after 12 payments), while Sprint's iPhone Forever agreement runs 18 months (you can upgrade after 12 payments) and leasing an Android device from Sprint requires a 24-month agreement. T-Mobile's Jump On Demand (which lets you upgrade your phone three times a year) runs for 18 months, while ZTE's SmartPay lease program has 6-, 9-, 18- and 24-month iterations.
Comparing pricing among rival lease programs also proves challenging. T-Mobile offers the lowest monthly leasing fee, but that requires a trade-in of an eligible device. Apple's iPhone Upgrade Program is the most expensive, with a 16GB iPhone 6s leasing for $32.41 a month, but Apple includes two years of AppleCare+ protection for your device.
Once your lease expires, you face a few choices. With Sprint, you can upgrade to a new device, buy your existing phone at the price listed on your lease agreement or continue with a month-to-month lease. With T-Mobile, you can pay off the residual purchase amount to keep your phone, or trade in your phone for a newly leased model.
In other words, leasing isn't as easy or simple as it sounds once you drill down. We asked both Sprint and T-Mobile for copies of their lease agreements to check for any other caveats, but neither carrier provided one.
Sprint has leased phones for several years and introduced a new leasing program in July called Sprint Flex. Although there are some differences with Flex, the lease plans work the same when it comes to out-of-term revenues.
Older leases at Sprint, those taken out before mid-July, require the customer to pay the full amount at one time. Sprint Flex spreads the payments over six months after the lease has expired. Sprint plans to add this option to those older leases in March.
By the time a customer reaches the end of a lease, the company typically has sent 10 emails or texts letting customers know about their options. These advise customers when they can first upgrade, when their lease is nearing its end and that they have the option to buy, upgrade or continue leasing.
Lease payments, like installment plan payments, are more affordable to some consumers than the full upfront price of high-end cell phones. Leasing also avoids the additional upfront burden of paying sales tax, which Sprint said it collects through the lease payments.
**Monthly charges exclude taxes & Sprint Surcharges [incl. USF charge of up to 19.5% (varies quarterly), up to $2.50 Admin. & .40 Reg. /ln./mo. & fees by area (approx. 5-20%)]. Surcharges are not taxes. See sprint.com/taxesandfees. May require up to a $36 activation fee/ln., credit approval, deposit. Up to $350/ln. early termin. fee (ETF) for Advanced Devices & up to $200 ETF/ln. for other devices applies (no ETF for Agreements cancelled in compliance with Sprint's Return Policy).
Activ. Fee: $36/ln. Credit approval required. $60 Unlimited Plan: Includes unlimited domestic Long Distance calling, texting and data. Third-party content/downloads are add'l charge. Int'l svcs are not included. Pricing may vary for existing customers. Excludes discounted phones. Plan will appear on your bill as $30/Unltd Talk & Text and $30/Unlimited Data. Includes unlimited on-network data. Customers under a 1 or 2 year Service Agreement and moving to the Sprint $60 Unlimited plan have a higher monthly rate of up to $25/mo. until they reach upgrade eligibility. Early Upgrade for Easy Pay: Req. active add-on thru time of upgrade with min. 12 consecutive payments of both the add-on and an installment agreement for phones, new phone Installment Agreement, acct. in good standing, & give back of current eligible device in good & functional condition. After upgrade, remaining unbilled installment payments for giveback device are waived. Requires enrollment w/i 30 days of new activation or upgrade on eligible phone. Usage Limitations: To improve data experience for the majority of users, throughput may be limited, varied or reduced on the network. Sprint may terminate phone service if off-network roaming usage in a mo. exceeds: (1) 800 min. or a majority of min.; or (2) 100MB or a majority of KB. Prohibited network use rules apply - see sprint.com/termsandconditions. Other Terms: Offers and coverage not available everywhere or for all phones/networks. Restrictions apply. The Nationwide Sprint Network reaches over 281 million people. Sprint 3G network reaches over 281 million people. Sprint 4G LTE network reaches over 225 million people. See sprint.com/coverage. 2015 Sprint. All rights reserved. No credit check devices: Not eligible for the Sprint Discount Program. Account balance may not exceed $150/ln. at any time or the account and all services will be suspended completely until account balance is paid in full. Not combinable with offers that req. credit approval and may not be combinable with other offers.
First a little background. In late 2017, Lendlease (a global infrastructure company that has formed a tower company) and Softbank (majority owner of Sprint) formed a joint venture to acquire 8,000 cell sites from Sprint across the US. We believe that these acquired sites are mostly rooftops. We suspected at the time that this was a financing transaction that Sprint entered into because it knew that if a Sprint/T-Mobile merger came to pass, Sprint might end up terminating a good number of those leases. We suspect that Lendlease/Softbank paid a reduced value for the leases as compared to what the market was paying, probably because both parties knew of the potential risk from a T-Mobile/Sprint transaction. You might ask why Lendlease/Softbank would buy these leases if there was potential risk? There are three reasons:
It was a pleasure speaking with you this morning. The intent of my telephone call and this follow up email is to inform you of the project currently underway in the US by the Sprint/Lendlease Joint Venture as described in the press release and Letters of Authorizations. Sprint is assessing all of its rooftop network real estate in order to assure maximum cost efficiency. It has relocated many sites that are not efficient. The site as referenced above currently remains one of a group of sites identified as a cost efficiency target in the Sprint/Lendlease Joint Venture. In addition, I have attached some press releases speculating on the outcome of the announcement regarding the possible merger of Sprint/T-Mobile for informational purposes only. My goal is to have an amended and restated lease executed once we have negotiated the most favorable terms for the mutual benefit of both Landlord and Tenant.
Tower Alliance on behalf of Lendlease then asks for a number of concessions from the building owner on the new lease, which we have listed below along with our thoughts on why such changes are ultimately really bad for the building owner. 041b061a72