To buy vs. lease equipment Cancel The title field is required!

1. Holt Michael

   
   4/15/2013 4:04 PM

   I know this question has been asked a million times. I think it depends on your cash flow situation and many other factors. My question is for everyone that has units with over 3000 hours on them. How many mowers of this type do you have and what do you do in the case where the unit goes down and has to be out of service for weeks during your busy season? I currently have 4 triplexes, 2 for greens and 2 for tees, 2 fairway units and the normal of everything else and lease about 60% of my fleet. With those numbers, my equipment repairs and maintenance is only $11,000 per year. How many triplexes/fairway units does a golf course that owns it's equipment have and what is your R&M budget? I do about 225 rounds per day for 6 months and the thought of a mower going down during this time is why I lease. If I should decide to one day purchase equipment, should I double the number of units that I have for more back ups? Just looking for input, thanks.

   
   
   
   
2. Dave Birrer

   

   0 posts
   
   4/17/2013 9:04 AM

   Based on my personal experiences and the courses I've worked at, that amount of equipment seems to be pretty standard (lease or own). I think it comes down to the expectations of the course you are at. Having equipment down is just part of the game. If you decide to go down the "owning" equipment path, I would suggest having a definitive plan on when to replace each piece before you start putting serious money into all of it just to keep it up and running. All of my current equipment is at least 10 years old. 4 triplexes w/ over 4500 hours and 2 fairway mowers with 4000+ hours. Management has decided that spending the $35,000+ a year just to keep it running is a lot easier to do than to spend the money to replace it.

   
   
   
   
3. David Brandenburg

   

   3 posts
   
   4/17/2013 2:04 PM

   I think leasing is more popular in the south where the season is longer or never-ending so you put a lot more hours on equipment. For us in the north we give up too many lease hours so we tend to purchase more items.
   
   We have 27 holes so we have 3 tee and 3 greensmowers for daily use. We use a triplex for 6 to 10 years and then it becomes a tee mower for another 6 to 10 years and then it becomes a roller, verticut unit or spare mower.
   
   If you buy equipment you do not need to double your fleet but if have 4 triplexes I would suggest keeping one used triplex with backup greensreels on it for occasional use and to switch that out a tee or verticut unit whenever you needed it.
   
   With three 9's we keep 4 fairway mowers with one of them being over 15 years old. We are just getting rid of two 1989 LF-100's this year that were used regularly last year. We may have gotten our moneys worth out of them and they still cut great but the frames are wilting away.
   
   We rarely have breakdowns to take out a unit for more than a couple days and then it is just because we are waiting for parts. We average 22-28,000 a year in equipment maintenance.

   
   
   
   
4. Steven Huffstutler

   

   11 posts
   
   4/17/2013 3:04 PM

   I lease mowers and buy everything else. The mowers are leased for 3 years and they are pretty well used up by then. I buy carts and keep them until they need motors, then I dump them and buy a new one. I buy tractors...they last forever. I buy heavy duty work carts and keep them, never sold one yet. I keep one spare triplex and two spare sets of reels.
   
   I buy sprayers and keep them for 4 or 5 years, then I sell them and buy a new one.
   
   It makes more sense for us to lease the mowers than to dump huge amounts of money into worn out junk and it forces the club to put money into equipment every year, so we get to upgrade to newer technology.
   
   Regards,
   
   Steve

   
   
   
   
5. Justin VanLanduit

   

   0 posts
   
   4/18/2013 10:04 AM

   We just did a conversion to leasing high use equipment this year. We looked at the amount of money we were putting into 7-12 year old pieces of equipment and their reliability. I ended up setting up a lease on 4 new fairway mowers, tee/approach mowers(5 Toro 1000's), 2 rough mowers, 2 triplexes, and 2 bunker machines. This was the best way for me to update our fleet for the lowest amount of cost at the time. At the end of the lease if we want to buy a piece we can as we were able to negotiate a FMV cap on it. I estimate that over the 5 year lease on these pieces we will save roughly 70-80k in equipment repair/labor which is just about a years lease payment. With the changes in technology I also felt that this gives us the ability to keep current especially with the amount computer stuff involved. If we were to own I'd probably have to send my tech to school or find a new tech to understand all the new diesel engine and components. Like Steve we then buy our carts, tractors, sprayers, aerifiers, etc.. "low use" equipment. This club has always bought everything and when I arrived 5 years ago there was a barn full of equipment that didn't run/barely run that wasn't worth much. As specialty as some of this stuff is it's hard to pay 50k for a fairway mower then after 7-8 years of use only get 2-3k back for it.