Buy used car with cash, or finance new at 0% rate?

My wife recently got into an accident and her car is totaled. Thankfully she's OK. This was the first time we bought a 'nicer' new car and it was an electric Mustang MachE. She LOVED that car and it saved her life in the accident, so we want to get another one. We have 2 options:

  1. Buy used - we can get a used '23 model with decent mileage from 32k-36k. Given the used car loan rates at the moment - around 6.5% - we'd likely just pay cash. The cash burden wouldn't be too stressful as we're lucky enough have an emergency fund for this type of situation.

  2. Buy new - The similar new car, a 2025 model, goes for about 51k all-in. The total price is obviously a lot higher, BUT Ford currently has a 0.0% Financing promotion. We have great credit so I'm confident we would be approved for that. I ran the numbers and a 72 month finance at a 0% rate would have a payment ~$710/month.

My question is, which option would you do? Is there one that's overall better longer term? With the used, the purchase price is obviously lower, but that's a lot of cash to drop at once. With the new, I could continue investing that cash and get ~4.5% return as of today, but also have those monthly payments.

Thanks for your thoughts!

Posted Aug 7, 2025, 4:38 PM UTC

926
Loading comments…