Well I'm looking too buy a mini bc the last 4 months I have spent at least 1000$ a month on rental of a mini from a local rental business. The majority of my work is in commercial aquatics I Have a contract with a commercial pool builder to do all the excavation for the piping. My work load is very high for the spring there r 6 jobs that I have with others to be added very soon just in the aquatics side that will be completed before June and I'm sure I'll pick up some residitual jobs in the area too in the spring.
So you have the work, the cash flow and are spending enough on rental to justify purchasing - it's time to buy IMO. Problem is you are a new company/entity without
established credit.
My suggestion would be to RPO (rental purchase option) a machine and convert it to a purchase a couple of months or whatever parameters you can get from the dealer. Basically you rent the machine monthly but have an option to pull the trigger and purchase the machine and a % (from 70-90%) of the rent you have already paid goes towards the purchase price and is your down payment.
The rent paid which becomes your down payment shows the finance company you have the ability to pay for the machine, thus helping your termed financing and your credit. For example if you would have RPO'd the mini you have been using for the last 4 months, you would have 70-90% of that $4000 as a down payment on the machine. You also don't have to use your cash on hand, you build up your equity as you work it.
Another bonus to RPO is if you don't like the machine or it doesn't fit your operation, you can turn it in and just pay the rent you already were paying.
This program can be done for new or used. I recently converted a 321DL from a RPO to a purchase from my Cat dealer. You will probably have to go to a dealer to get an RPO but it's worth it to check it out.