From what I see, zero financing gives you a higher price. They basically give it to you interest free, but dump all the interest you would have paid into the price of the vehicle. There are also loans out there (my brother in law has one) where you need to check the fine print--if he pays it off early, he pays the interest the loan WOULD have earned.

I just got lucky on lowering the APR on mine.

I had my bank agent find the vehicle and argue it down for me. I might have been able to get a better deal if I did it myself, but I can't complain as it was a lot of work to find what I wanted and she called all over the southwest.

I'm only paying $200/month rent now, so I'm going to stay here for a little while. I'm dumping money into investments where I can. Once I get more settled in life (read: post miltary/new stable job) I might try the housing trick, but that would have to be a second house since I have a family. But that is a digression off saving money on an Isuzu vehicle.