How the contracts actually differ.
The mechanics behind the structure pages. Where the GST and the depreciation actually fall, how a residual works and what it defers, what the accounting treatment does to a balance sheet, and what the register shows before an asset changes hands.
Hire purchase against finance lease
The comparison almost every business arrives with, and the one most often decided on the wrong number. A lease payment is lower because less is being repaid, not because the finance is cheaper.
Read onHow residuals and balloons work
Deferred principal, priced. This guide covers how lenders arrive at the number, what it costs to defer, and why the exit has to be chosen before the agreement is signed rather than at the end of it.
Read onGST and depreciation on financed assets
Two businesses buying identical assets on the same day can end up with different tax outcomes purely because of the agreement they signed. This guide explains the mechanism and points at who settles it.
Read onLease accounting under IFRS 16
The old idea that leasing keeps assets off the balance sheet stopped being generally true. Whether it stopped being true for a particular business depends entirely on which reporting framework it uses.
Read onThe PPSR and security interests
Almost every asset finance facility in New Zealand is recorded on one public register. Understanding what it records, and what it does not, is the difference between buying a machine and buying somebody else’s debt.
Read onSale and leaseback explained
A sale and leaseback converts an owned asset into cash without the asset leaving the yard. It is a genuine tool with a real cost, and the cost is easy to lose sight of because the cash arrives first.
Read onEnd of term options
Most of the cost of an asset finance facility is settled in the first month. Most of the avoidable cost is settled in the last one, by a business making a choice it had not thought about until the letter arrived.
Read onWhat asset lenders assess
Asset finance is assessed differently from an unsecured business loan, because there is a machine in the middle of it. Understanding what moves the decision explains most of what looks arbitrary from the outside.
Read onWhere to start
Eight guides, in the order most people need them.
The structure pages answer what each arrangement is. These guides answer why the answers are what they are, and they are worth reading in roughly this order.
Hire purchase against finance lease is the comparison almost everybody arrives with, and it covers the deferred residual that makes one payment lower than the other. How residuals and balloons work goes underneath it, into how lenders set the number and what happens when it is set too high.
GST and depreciation on financed assets covers the tax side, which is the part most often decided after the documents are signed and most usefully considered before. Lease accounting under IFRS 16 covers the balance-sheet question, which matters to businesses that report under it and not at all to those that do not, and the guide says which is which rather than assuming.
PPSR and security interests covers what a financier actually registers and why a search precedes any purchase of a used asset. Sale and leaseback explained covers the one arrangement here that starts with an asset the business already owns. End of term options covers the moment most facilities are decided by and few are planned for. What asset lenders assess covers the application itself.
How these are written
Primary sources, hedged numbers, no borrowed copy.
Every numeric or regulatory claim in these guides links to a primary New Zealand source the first time it appears. Inland Revenue for depreciation and GST, the Companies Office for the Personal Property Securities Register, the legislation itself for the statutory provisions, the External Reporting Board for accounting standards, and the Reserve Bank for rate context.
Nothing here is paraphrased from a comparison site or from a lender’s marketing pages. That is a deliberate rule rather than a preference. Paraphrasing another publisher adopts their claims, including any that were never substantiated in the first place, and a claim adopted second-hand is still one this site would have to stand behind.
Where a number cannot be sourced, it is hedged or it is cut. Bands described as indicative are indicative, and the absence of a precise figure in places where one would read better is usually deliberate.
FAQ
About these guides
How often are these guides reviewed?
Each carries a last-reviewed date on the page and in the sitemap, and that date moves when the content is genuinely revised rather than on a schedule. Contract structures change slowly, and accounting standards, depreciation rates and lender practice all move, so a stale date on a money topic is worse than no date.
Who writes them?
Each guide names its author and their role in the byline, and that name is emitted as a Person in the page’s structured data rather than as the site itself. The author is a real reviewer rather than a house name, because on a money topic the identity of whoever stands behind the content is part of what a reader is entitled to see.
Do the guides recommend a particular structure?
No. They set out what each does and who it tends to suit, and stop there. The right structure depends on the cash position, the tax position and what the business intends for the asset, and a page recommending one without seeing those would be giving advice rather than information.
Do they recommend a lender?
No. Lenders are described generically, by the kind of institution rather than by name, because a specific comparison would need current pricing that cannot be substantiated on a page that stays up for months. The one relationship this site has is with Prospa, and it is disclosed on every page rather than buried.
Why do the tax sections keep mentioning an accountant?
Because the treatment genuinely depends on facts this site cannot see. The accounting basis, the ownership position under the chosen structure, and the asset category all change the answer, and the accountant is the person with the whole picture. The caveat appears at each claim rather than once at the bottom for that reason.
Is anything here personalised financial advice?
No. Everything on this site is general information about how a class of finance works, which is what New Zealand’s financial advice regime calls class information. Personalised recommendations require a Financial Advice Provider licence this site does not hold, and nothing here is written as a recommendation to any individual reader.
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