In April we flagged that van loan math had reset between Q1 and Q2. The curve didn't stop moving.
The Federal Reserve's H.15 series now shows the 5-year Treasury at 4.15% for May — up from 3.94% in April, 3.85% in March, and 3.68% in February. That's a 47 basis-point climb in three months, and it pushes the benchmark above its 5-year 75th percentile (4.14%) for the first time in this cycle. Moody's BAA corporate yield sits at 6.10%, within three basis points of its 5-year 90th percentile. Risk-free rates and credit spreads are elevated at the same time — the expensive combination.
Translated to the fleet lease benchmark we publish (GS5 + 400 bps), indicative pricing moved from roughly 7.7% in February to 8.15% today.
Per-van, the move is modest and worth stating honestly: on a $52,000 van financed over 60 months, the February-to-May rate shift adds about $12 a month — roughly $720 over the term. Nobody cancels a needed replacement over $12 a month. But three things compound it:
Fleet refresh math scales it. A 10-van refresh carries about $7,200 of additional financing cost across the terms; a 40-van cycle, near $29,000. Silent, but real.
It moves the repair-vs-replace breakeven. Every replacement decision is a race between a rising repair curve and the cost of new money. When money gets 47 bps more expensive, marginal replacements tip back toward one more repair cycle — if the repair curve cooperates. That's a per-vehicle calculation, not a fleet-wide rule.
The percentile matters more than the print. At the 75th percentile, the honest planning assumption is not "rates will revert before my term starts." Operators who priced deals in Q1 got the better curve; operators pricing now should underwrite at today's, and treat any future relief as upside rather than the plan.
One counterweight worth knowing: the prime rate has been flat at 6.75% all spring — below its own 5-year median of 7.5%. Floating-rate working capital hasn't repriced the way term money has. The squeeze is specifically in the term-debt channel that fleet purchases live in.
The takeaway isn't "don't buy vans." It's that the financing line on a summer acquisition deserves the same scrutiny as the purchase price — and the assumption it's priced on should come from the curve as it is, not as it was in January.
Run the full repair-or-replace math, including financing, free: pexara.ai/calculator