To match the price reductions of the upcoming 2023 model year Bolt EV and EUV, Chevrolet is now offering a $5,900 and $6,300 customer cash incentive on the 2022 Bolt EV hatchback and 2022 Bolt EUV subcompact SUV, respectively.

With today’s high gas prices, many drivers are looking to electric vehicles to avoid pain at the pump. The 2022 Bolt EV and EUV are among the most affordable electric vehicles out there, and with about 250 miles of range and silent operation, they make for an excellent commuter vehicle.

How much should you expect to pay for a 2022 Bolt EV or EUV? And is it better to lease or finance one in today’s market?

2022 Bolt Purchase Incentives are Much Stronger than Lease Incentives

In the past, we’ve recommended leasing, rather than buying, a Bolt. GM poured thousands of dollars in lease incentives and set optimistic residual values that made leasing a no brainer. Recently, however, GM turned the tables on Bolt EV and Bolt EUV to favor purchasing.

Purchase Incentives

As mentioned earlier, 2022 Bolt EV and Bolt EUV get $5,900 and $6,300 in customer cash respectively—but only for purchases, not leases.

On top of that, GM is offering for purchases:

• A $3,750 incentive for those who turn in their current Bolt leases. Note that existing lessees may be better off cashing out on their positive lease equity instead of using this incentive, if they have more than $3,750 in lease equity.

• A purchase-only $2,000 incentive for Uber drivers, or a $1,500 GM Supplier incentive, or a $500 educator/military/first responder incentive. Note that both the Uber and GM Supplier incentive cannot be stacked with the $3,750 returning Bolt lease incentive.

• A $500 healthcare professional and a $500 recent college grad incentive, both of which can be stacked on top of either the GM Supplier incentive or returning Bolt lease incentive, and the educator/military/first responder incentive, but not the Uber incentive.

Lease Incentives

Disappointingly, GM is not offering the $5,900 or $6,300 customer cash on GM Financial leases.

For leases, GM is offering:

• The $3,750 incentive for those who turn in their current Bolt lease. (Check your existing lease equity before using this incentive.)

• A $1,500 incentive for current lessees of any car (i.e., GM Lease Loyalty or Lease Conquest incentive), or a $750 GM Supplier incentive, or a $500 educator/military/first responder incentive.

• A $500 healthcare professional and a $500 recent college grad incentive, which may be stacked on top of the incentives above.

All in all, the incentives for 2022 Bolt are significantly higher on a purchase than a lease.

Total Cost of Ownership is Likely Lower with a Purchase

To see whether it’s cheaper to lease or buy, we plugged in the numbers to our updated Leasehackr Calculator, which now features a lease-versus-finance tool.

For this comparison, we are using a base 2022 Bolt EUV LT. For the month of July 2022, GM Financial has set the lease residual value at 62% of MSRP (36 month, 10,000 mile per year lease) and the lease money factor at .00069 (equivalent to 1.66% APR).

For the finance option, we are assuming a 72-month loan at 3.99% APR, and we are assuming that the vehicle will also be worth 62% of its MSRP after three years.

In both cases, we are assuming the vehicle will be sold at MSRP (no dealer markup) with Southern California sales tax (9.5%), fees, and rebates. You can adjust inputs on the Leasehackr Calculator to reflect the actual selling price of the vehicle and your local taxes and fees.

With the same amount due at signing, we can see that the monthly payments for lease, ($433) and finance ($464) are surprisingly close. (Usually, monthly payments for leases are much lower than that for financing.)

In terms of the total cost of operation over 36 months, the finance option is likely cheaper, with an effective monthly cost of $288 compared to $405 with the lease. The higher incentives for purchasing more than offset the higher interest and greater taxes paid with the finance option, resulting in over $5,000 in positive equity 36 months into the loan.

This conclusion, of course, assumes that the actual resale value of the vehicle, after three years, matches GM Financial’s lease residual value of 62% of MSRP, or $21,077. Should the actual value of the Bolt EUV, after three years, be lower than the lease residual value, then the cost difference between leasing and financing starts to narrow.

At the end of the day, there is no crystal ball to predict future vehicle values. With leasing, one advantage is that the risk of depreciation is passed onto the lender. However, in this case, it may be worthwhile for a consumer to take on that depreciation risk if the cash incentives are significantly greater on a purchase than on a lease.