These contracts aren't available through the same channels that you'd purchase equipment through. They're often offered to low-income homeowners, or sold by (shady, IMO) repair workers.

Many home equipment leases are abusive in nature -- they're deliberately made hard to cancel, with many leasors attaching extortionate "equipment removal" fees to cancellation.

Oh, okay. I guess I'm just not familiar with them because I never sought them out. I was assuming if they were common the installer would say "here's the quote for installation and here's the quote for leasing"