Buy a mini for 50%, pay nothing for two years

This is not a spam post! I saw this today advertised in The Telegraph and it made me think about my views of ownership. You see I don’t really want to own much — especially technology, cars in particular but also mobile phones. Car need maintenance and mobiles go out of date within 6 months. I want someone else to handle the pain so I can just get the utility. That’s sort of what we see in the car industry with leasing however it’s still all based on the purchase price and perceived ‘value’ of the vehicle. I just want the utility with all the costs rolled in. This offer from BMW will give you a Mini for half price. Then in two years you either give it back and get a new one or pay off the balance and own it. I like the idea of getting a new one. It’s the same with phones. When will one of our manufacturers (or operators) start to offer this kind of thing? O2 is very much getting there with their iPhone lease offers. That rocks. I’d like to see what Apple, Nokia or HTC would do. Could I subscribe to HTC, for example, paying a tenner a month or 20 a month and get a new handset every 6 months (giving the old one back for them to resell)?

I wonder.

Posted via email from MIR Live