Movies–Rent Vs. Own: Which Is Better?

December 21, 2007 By Matthew Paulson

I recently took a trip to the local Century movie theater to see a film called “Dan in Real Life.” After paying for the tickets, a beverage for each of us and a large bag of popcorn, the total bill ended up being $27.00, and I live in rural South Dakota! It might not be a ton of money for a night on the town, but for watching a movie, that’s rather expensive. It certainly makes sense that watching a movie at home is probably a lot cheaper than taking the family to the theater, but what’s the cheapest way to get movies to watch at home? Should we rent them from the local video store or buy them and keep them in a collection?

You will pay about $3.00 for a typical movie rental, this could very $2.00 either way depending on where you get them. Usually the local stores will have lower rates than the big chain stores such as BlockBuster and Hollywood Video, so call around and ask what their fee is for a typical rental and go to the cheapest store if you plan on renting movies on a regular basis.

When you rent a movie, you’ll be able to see the movie once for the $3.00 fee. If the movie is terrible and not worth anyones time to watch, you made a wise decision by previewing it first before you owned it, and saved yourself a good $10-$12. If the movie was great, you loved it and will want to watch it again in the future, you’ll then be paying $3.00 you wouldn’t have paid otherwise if you had just gone out and purchased the movie.

The cost of buying DVDs will vary dramatically depending on how recent the movie was released and whether you buy the movie new or used. Where you buy the movie from is also a big factor in determining cost. New releases will retail anywhere from $15-$20, but the big box stores frequently have decent movies for $8-$12 and sometimes even have a bargain bin with $5.00 movies. If you have some old VHS films lying around, you might consider a Film to DVD or a Film to Video service.

When it comes to buying movies, there are two places you can get a real steal. The first is at your local video store. Often they purchase a bunch of new releases to rent out right away, and after the movie is no longer a new release they will sell some of the copies for a discounted price. Sometimes you can get pre-viewed DVDs for $4-$8 at a local movie store. You can also purchase movies on the Amazon Marketplace or eBay for anywhere from $2-$10 depending on how many people are selling the movie, unfortunately the cost of shippnig will had $2.00 or $3.00 to the price of the DVD, but it’s still a bargain none-the-less.

So what’s the verdict? You’ll have to view a movie about 3 times before it pays for it self, and most of us will watch the movies in our collection at least that many times. If you can get movies at discounted prices from the pre-viewed movie bin, Amazon, or eBay, it will make even more sense to go out and buy movies. You also have movies sitting there waiting in the event you have no motivation to go out to the rental store, so that’s a benefit too. In most cases it makes sense to purchase DVDs. If you’re not sure you want to buy a DVD because you don’t know if the movie will be any god, go ahead and rent if first, and if you like it, then go out and buy it.

Don’t let you old home movies go to waste either, there’s always the option of using a digital film transfer service to bring those old films into the modern age.

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