When you have a large yard on your home gardening costs can add up in a hurry. One of the ways to keep down the gardening costs is by taking excellent care of the tools and supplies you own so that they will see years of use. Another strategy is to lease high-priced garden tools and equipment instead of buying these tools outright.
When does it make sense to rent instead of buying? For our family, if the garden tool will only be used once a year or less, then leasing is the smarter option. Leasing garden equipment is not only easier on the budget, but it also frees up storage space in your tool shed. Leasing also means that you don’t have to bother with winterizing or taking it in for routine service. Here are five lawn and garden tools that make sense to lease:
Rototillers
This basic garden tool tills the soil under and prepares it for planting. To buy, a quality rototiller runs about $600 with a two-hour rental only costing $35. Even though you have nearly 1800 square feet of tillable garden space, two hours of rental time a year is more than enough.
Woodchipper
For families with numerous trees and shrubs in their yard, a wood chipper is a great tool for reducing the branches into mulch. A high-quality wood chipper starts at $2200 with a two-hour rental running $80. If you are mulching branches and twigs once a month, you might consider buying one of these tools. For the once every two years that your family has tree limbs for mulching, leasing makes more sense.
Power rake
If your lawn suffers from thatch build-up, a power rake is a gentle way to remove the thatch without damaging the lawn itself. Since a lawn should only be power raked in the fall, you always felt it was silly for you to buy this machine for $1500 when a two-hour rental is only $40.
Log splitter
You supplement your household heat with a wood insert using wood that you’ve pruned from trees in the yard. While most of the wood is cut up with a chainsaw, tougher pieces have to be split with a log splitter. An all-day rental costs $90, compared to a $2000 purchase price. Again, unless you are using this tool for several weeks at a stretch, renting is the more affordable alternative.
Gas-powered lawn edger
With over 350 feet of sidewalk on and surrounding our property, preventing the grass from encroaching over the concrete takes regular maintenance. To jump-start the summer lawn care season, rent a gas-powered lawn edger for a couple of hours to trim away heavy grass buildup. Even though gas-powered lawn-edgers aren’t terribly expensive to buy at $300, a two hour rental for $30 is all you really need since the edges can be kept under control with a string trimmer for the rest of the summer.
Conclusion
There’s no arguing that owning specialty yard equipment is convenient, especially for families who do a lot of gardening. However, for those who are watching costs — and that’s most of us these days, renting large garden tools instead of buying them is much easier on the wallet.
