Hard disagree. Let's assume that you have a 3 year, 10k loan at 1% on a 12k vehicle just to make the math easy. Let's also assume that the market does 5% over those 3 years (but bear in mind -- there are plenty of three year spans where it returned more or less). So, the delta here is about a 4% return.

Check my math, but we're talking about $1200 over that full three years. But bear in mind -- there's probably going to be a 1% of the vehicle cost origination fee on the loan (if not other fees/costs). So, that means there was a loan origination fee of about...$1200. In other words: there is literally no difference financially between the two options. You're just buying the right to have any insurance payments take longer to process b/c they have to deal with the loan.

Keep it simple. Pay cash.