[marcofatica]

Why is this being treated like a new concept? Has the author never heard of layaway? It used to be quite common, and this is a strictly better version imo

[woodruffw]

Layaway is a different scheme: you pay down the price of a purchase in installments, and receive the item after the last payment. The layaway agreements that I'm aware of don't charge interest.

These schemes are VC-ified installment loans, which operate on the opposite model: you receive the purchase up front, and pay it down over time including interest payments.

They're arguably better on a strictly economic scale, since they give consumers the liquidity to make purchases that they'd like to make (and can actually afford, just not all at once.) They're arguably worse on a social scale, since installment loans are a form of cheap credit that people get addicted to, and are comparatively unregulated.

[stuff4ben]

I bought something off Amazon with Affirm, wasn't charged interest. I think they make money by partnering with companies like Amazon to promote more buyers and get a cut of sales from them instead of the consumer.

[marcofatica]

Most of the ones I've seen had no interest, so that's new to me. Definitely changes it but I think it's a little disingenuous for the author to not at least reference layaway

[EddieDante]

I miss layaway, and TBH I wish we had layaway for big-ticket items like houses, cars, and POWER9 workstations.

[dhosek]

I never really got the point of layaway. I give you money and you keep it interest-free until I pay for the item? Why not just put it into my own savings account and at least get interest on it?