Buy vs Lease for soon to be parents

Hoping for advice! My husband and I are expecting first time parents and are looking at upsizing from my Toyota Corolla.

I am looking at Compact SUV - specifically CRV and Tucson as they are largest in their class. This is due to my husband driving larger SUVs, and still living in the city (for a bit longer).

However, when I look ahead we may have another child in 3 years and want to change out of the car for something larger. My initial plan was to buy and keep until payoff in 5 years then re-evaluate upsizing again if needed (more kids). I could see being tempted to upsize before this, but generally I’m pretty good at sticking with a car - I’ve had mine for 12 years. Husband is very pro-lease in this scenario as I do not plan to keep the car long term.

Financial breakdown is below:
Lease
36 month 2,500 down - 448/month

Buy
5 year with 10,000 down at 3.9% - 548/month

What would you do in this scenario if money is there to make the purchase? I’m usually very against leasing but this scenario has me questioning.

Posted Jul 6, 2026, 8:59 PM UTC

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