What's the OPTIMAL Macbook Pro Sell and Upgrade Schedule to Maximize Savings?

[the future]

Also, depending on the schedule you ultimately decide on, you should configure the new Mac differently. Upgrade often: get the minimum configuration you need for your work right now. Upgrade rarely: get the maximum configuration you can afford right now.

 

[ericwn]

Awesome responses. Thank you so much.

Clarification: The max I'd probably want to wait is 3 years to upgrade just so I can get the latest tech for video editing.

So I'm trying to maximize re-sale and upgrade within a 3 year time span. So my question is more... is every 1, 2, or 3 years ideal?

pick 2 as the middle ground and stop overthinking it You'll always get a wide variety of answers. The prices for equipment selling used might fluctuate at times a bit too, so it's really hard to come up with a general rule.

 

[maerz001]

pick 2 as the middle ground and stop overthinking it You'll always get a wide variety of answers. The prices for equipment selling used might fluctuate at times a bit too, so it's really hard to come up with a general rule.

If its just about money saving there is a rule.
Almost all products (computers, mobiles, cars…) lose in the beginning the most value and then flattens the curve.

e.g. midrange macbook pro for $3000.

if u sell it after 1 year you lose about 30% ($1000 )
but after 3 years its still worth 30-50% when u check on ebay ($500-650/loss year).

 

[Analog Kid]

Total return as in income potential minus costs.

Total return is if you buy something that's underpowered and then have to add hardware shortly thereafter to get to where you can get more work done in the same amount of time. There are lots of use cases where more horsepower is needed but not available.

I think you're reading things into that first post that aren't there. There was no mention of income or use cases requiring horsepower-- the only question was how to save the most money.

Later, OP indicated they wanted to upgrade within a 3 year window and wanted to know when in that window is best. Now we have a second constraint we can optimize within. Video editing was the use case given, but no mention of whether it's an income generating operation so we still can't solve for income minus costs and thus "total return" isn't the analysis to use here.

 

[Analog Kid]

If its just about money saving there is a rule.
Almost all products (computers, mobiles, cars…) lose in the beginning the most value and then flattens the curve.

e.g. midrange macbook pro for $3000.

if u sell it after 1 year you lose about 30% ($1000 )
but after 3 years its still worth 30-50% when u check on ebay ($500-650/loss year).

If that's true, and it probably is, and if you're willing to keep a computer for 3 years, then the best way to save money is probably to buy a one year old machine and sell it after the third year. Same logic as with cars.

 

[maerz001]

If that's true, and it probably is, and if you're willing to keep a computer for 3 years, then the best way to save money is probably to buy a one year old machine and sell it after the third year. Same logic as with cars.

Actually the longer you wait the better for your Portemonnaie (if it doesn’t break).
A 10 year old machine you can buy and sell for about the same price as a 12 year old. So in the end u can use it basically almost for free. But then other effects might come into play like speed / repair costs.

 

[Christopher Kim]

Hard to give a timeframe in terms of years when we still don't have a regular update schedule for Apple Silicon Macs. Perhaps generations would be better in this case. With that being said, I used the trade-in calculator to estimate the trade-in values for similarly configured machines from 2021, 2020, and mid-2020 (last Intel models). Here are the trade-in values I got:

Spoiler: Rest of Post...

2021: $875
2020: $655
Mid-2020 (Intel): $510

Now here's where things get interesting. Assuming the MBP cost $1200 when new, that translates into the following "losses" (out of pocket costs) when trading in these machines:

2021: $325
2020: $545
Mid-2020: $690

Assuming you look at this over a six-year timespan (the one point where a 1, 2, or 3 year upgrade cycle all match back up), you get the following total out of pocket costs:

1 year interval: $1950 ($325 x 6)
2 year interval: $1635 ($545 x 3)
3 year interval: $1380 ($690 x 2)

So while upgrading annually presents a lower out of pocket cost in the moment due to higher trade-in values, over the span of several years it actually becomes the most expensive option. Meanwhile, the three year upgrade cycle saves almost $600 in out of pocket costs compared to the annual option.


As far as external costs associated with upgrading your systems (such as productivity costs, time, etc.), that's something only the person looking at their options for upgrading could decide.

This was good analysis. I think it would be interesting to do the same math, but 1) instead of using trade-in values (which removes the "headache" component of having to sell on Ebay / Swappa, but is significantly below fair market value), instead using the avg. selling price on one of the sites (probably Swappa given easiest to pull data); and 2) Use MBP prices probably closer to $2500 (ie. or whatever type of config OP wants to get - that would be mine, as I tend to get slightly higher than the base model configs and keep for awhile).

It might take some time, so not offering to do it lol, but if OP cared enough, that's probably the analysis that should be done if he wants to truly find his answer and optimize mathematically.

 

[Analog Kid]

Actually the longer you wait the better for your Portemonnaie (if it doesn’t break).
A 10 year old machine you can buy and sell for about the same price as a 12 year old. So in the end u can use it basically almost for free. But then other effects might come into play like speed / repair costs.

Yeah, but OP set a 3 year limit...

 

[scouser75]

A very interesting thread. Thank you OP.

I have a MBP M2 16" 1TB. Due to a faulty M1, this machine cost me £1,640. Brand new, the cheapest I've seen this spec MBP currently is £2,750.

If I were to sell this machine in a years time, what kind of price would I be looking at?

I might no longer need such a high spec laptop as my years of film editing is slowly come to an end, so my plan is to next year maybe swap this laptop for an Air M3 15".

 

[ericwn]

A very interesting thread. Thank you OP.

I have a MBP M2 16" 1TB. Due to a faulty M1, this machine cost me £1,640. Brand new, the cheapest I've seen this spec MBP currently is £2,750.

If I were to sell this machine in a years time, what kind of price would I be looking at?

I might no longer need such a high spec laptop as my years of film editing is slowly come to an end, so my plan is to next year maybe swap this laptop for an Air M3 15".

Having a computer that’s too powerful for oneself is novel way to justify buying the latest. Thank you for the idea!

 

[scouser75]

Having a computer that’s too powerful for oneself is novel way to justify buying the latest. Thank you for the idea!

My absolutely poorest of poor excuses are I'd had a 2009 Mac Pro since it was first released, so thought I could justify a MBP, and the other poor excuse is I had a long moment of madness 🤣

But in all seriousness, I seem to have got a good deal on the M2, and if I can sell a year later and get my money back, buy a cheaper model and still have change left over, why not! 😁

 

[ericwn]

My absolutely poorest of poor excuses are I'd had a 2009 Mac Pro since it was first released, so thought I could justify a MBP, and the other poor excuse is I had a long moment of madness

But in all seriousness, I seem to have got a good deal on the M2, and if I can sell a year later and get my money back, buy a cheaper model and still have change left over, why not!

If you can swing it, why not. There’s no wrong or right and life is short, treat yourself!

 

[scouser75]

Let's see how much the Mac Air 15" comes in at next week. The price of that might make me reconsider 😆

 

[dmccloud]

Let's see how much the Mac Air 15" comes in at next week. The price of that might make me reconsider 😆

That is the wildcard right now. Depending on specs and pricing, a 15" Air could change the equation entirely.

 

[h.gilbert]

From looking at average prices on eBay UK and comparing to price when new:

Macbook Pro 14" 2021 has depreciated at a rate of £335 per year
Macbook Air M1 2020 has depreciated at a rate of £162 per year

 

[scouser75]

I guess the 14" MBP is a lot more desirable than the 16". And the Airs are more affordable than the MBPs so maybe more popular.

I'll track my resale value over the months, but thankfully, if I do decide to sell, I'll be quids in for sure.

 

[G5isAlive]

Awesome responses. Thank you so much.

Clarification: The max I'd probably want to wait is 3 years to upgrade just so I can get the latest tech for video editing.

So I'm trying to maximize re-sale and upgrade within a 3 year time span. So my question is more... is every 1, 2, or 3 years ideal?

Two years.

 

[Wando64]

I'm trying to figure out the OPTIMAL Macbook Pro upgrade schedule that saves the most money.

Every 10 years.

Clarification: The max I'd probably want to wait is 3 years to upgrade just so I can get the latest tech for video editing.

Then every 3 years.

Basically, the longer you keep it the more money you save.
The biggest depreciation happens when you open the box.

 

[BigMcGuire]

I refuse to use Ebay or deal with potential theft. This means that my resale values are a lot lower than some. But, I find keeping an eye on Best Buy sales means that even Apple resale values can result in a much higher return. Best Buy often times offers $200-$300 more for MBP trade-ins than Apple too.

When my wife and I first joined Apple we got the base model MBA and used it for 3 years before selling it for 50% of what we got for it (bought it on huge discount at Best Buy). Then, after those, we got the midline MBP models and were able to do far more with them - and used those for 2-3 years before reselling them for a bit less % of return than the MBAs.

Then I ended up getting a much higher end model because of my work needs. I found the resale value on those to be quite poor but they held more value as time went on.

Saved up and got a near top of the line MBP 16 M1 Max. I can do EVERYTHING and Anything I ever wanted on this and it doesn't even spin the fans. (W11 with Parallels, etc). I've thrown everything at this machine for the last year and it isn't even breaking a sweat. I don't see myself upgrading for at least 3-4 more years. But the trade in value on this machine is horrific, lol.

So imo, based on my experience, a base model gives the best value for the $ but I couldn't use that to do much of anything on it. For me - a mid line model, keeping for a few years (AppleCare+) and then reselling was the best $ for the money. However, getting that 16 MBP - enjoyment factor is significantly higher than midline model, and probably will be for many more years. So much so I could see myself keeping this for 5+ years. So who knows. This might turn out to be better.

 

[Wando64]

From looking at average prices on eBay UK and comparing to price when new:

Macbook Pro 14" 2021 has depreciated at a rate of £335 per year
Macbook Air M1 2020 has depreciated at a rate of £162 per year

Depreciation is not linear

 

[h.gilbert]

Depreciation is not linear

Goes without saying. Those were average figures in the period since their release. I don't expect the MacBook Pro to be worth £0 by 2027.

 

[Acronyc]

For me, it's about five years for my main machine. This doesn't include Macs I buy that are broken to tinker with, fix, and resell, Macs I've bought for family members, or any Mac I keep as a backup machine.

I like to keep my Macs for as long as possible but not too long before they will have difficulty running my workload. For me, the M series chips has completely changed how long I feel like my Mac will remain viable. I think they will last much longer now.

My daily driver is a 14-inch M1 Max MBP that is awesome. It's the most expensive computer I've ever bought but has served me very well over the past 19 months. It's docked 90% of the time and it always amazes me how quiet and yet efficient and powerful it is for my workloads while running two external monitors and the internal display. The only time I ever hear the fans is when I'm rendering a video or playing a game, both of which are only a few times a month.

With the way this is performing for me, I'm confident it will easily last me until late 2026, which is when I might start looking to buy a new one. My last MBP was a 2016 non-TB 13-inch MBP which I used for five years without issue until the display died. Moving from that dual core to the 10 core M1 Max was such an awesome power boost. Before the 2016, I had a 2012 15-inch MBP that worked great for four years (and looking back, was much more versatile than my 2016 and I should have kept the 2012 longer).

I also recently picked up an M1 MacBook Air on sale. I've been traveling a lot more recently and while I find my 14-inch MBP very portable, I don't need all of it's power when traveling. Given how much I paid for my MBP (I know, it's not worth that anymore), I'd also rather not have it lost or stolen. The M1 Air is a perfect traveling Mac for me. It's powerful enough to handle everything I need while traveling, but also wasn't so expensive so I won't feel as big a dent in my wallet if it's stolen.

Sometimes I feel a bit silly having two laptops and have thought of maybe replacing my 14-inch MBP with a mini or Mac Studio or something. But I don't think the benefit would be worth the time and cost so I plan to keep this two laptop setup for some time, at least until 2026.

 

[scouser75]

For me, it's about five years for my main machine. This doesn't include Macs I buy that are broken to tinker with, fix, and resell, Macs I've bought for family members, or any Mac I keep as a backup machine.

I like to keep my Macs for as long as possible but not too long before they will have difficulty running my workload. For me, the M series chips has completely changed how long I feel like my Mac will remain viable. I think they will last much longer now.

My daily driver is a 14-inch M1 Max MBP that is awesome. It's the most expensive computer I've ever bought but has served me very well over the past 19 months. It's docked 90% of the time and it always amazes me how quiet and yet efficient and powerful it is for my workloads while running two external monitors and the internal display. The only time I ever hear the fans is when I'm rendering a video or playing a game, both of which are only a few times a month.

With the way this is performing for me, I'm confident it will easily last me until late 2026, which is when I might start looking to buy a new one. My last MBP was a 2016 non-TB 13-inch MBP which I used for five years without issue until the display died. Moving from that dual core to the 10 core M1 Max was such an awesome power boost. Before the 2016, I had a 2012 15-inch MBP that worked great for four years (and looking back, was much more versatile than my 2016 and I should have kept the 2012 longer).

I also recently picked up an M1 MacBook Air on sale. I've been traveling a lot more recently and while I find my 14-inch MBP very portable, I don't need all of it's power when traveling. Given how much I paid for my MBP (I know, it's not worth that anymore), I'd also rather not have it lost or stolen. The M1 Air is a perfect traveling Mac for me. It's powerful enough to handle everything I need while traveling, but also wasn't so expensive so I won't feel as big a dent in my wallet if it's stolen.

Sometimes I feel a bit silly having two laptops and have thought of maybe replacing my 14-inch MBP with a mini or Mac Studio or something. But I don't think the benefit would be worth the time and cost so I plan to keep this two laptop setup for some time, at least until 2026.

I kept my Mac Pro 2009 for 13 years... and still have it (although it no longer turns on and needs fixing). I do though now have a new MBP M2 16 to accompany the old girl 😁