I wholeheartedly agree with this.

After a lot of debate and research, I bought the Fall 2013 MBP from Apple refurbished in the middle of 2014. They do an incredible job refurbishing, to the point where there was no way you could tell it was a used device other than it arriving in a nondescript box. Plus, I saved something like $400 off the price of what was still the latest model at the time.

In the past two and a half years the only "problem" I've had is that one of the rubber feet came off. It's still got more than enough power for the foreseeable future as well. Definitely recommended.

Thanks, this actually sounds like the best compromise.

If you don't need retina and you want a 15" screen, I'd hunt down a 2012 15" MBP with a 1680x1050 screen. It's the last generation where you could make upgrades with commodity parts. You can even pull out the optical and stick in a second sata drive (but it will kill your battery). The i7 quad cores on those models still hold their own today.