Hello Dorico Team, and the rest of Steinberg,
Would be really nice if Dorico Pro is available for rent to own, this will surely will allow many people who can’t afford to pay for it
at once, to buy this product.
I hope you would think about it! 
Best regards
Steinberg’s current policy is not to do subscriptions, as far as I understand it. You might be waiting a while for this one…
Dorico Elements is only $100. Save up.
Not to niggle, but that’s not technically the same thing. NP does a rent-to-own, and once you finish paying, it’s yours.
That’s not to say Steinberg should or shouldn’t.
As dankrieder said, “…but that’s not technically the same thing.”. Rent-to-own means one to rent the software until he/she pays the retail price.
After that the license is yours. Exactly like the NotePerformer.
I’m sure that Steinberg will increase it’s market place if they offer the Rent-To-Own way to the users. And no one loses…
Some people need to spend more than month to fully explore the software, to feel if it fits their needs and workflow, or not.
Personally I’m against subscriptions… this is one of the most terrible things for the freelance users. It’s fine only if you use the software from time to time, or you are part of a company which pays for the subscriptions.
MiloDC, please, be serious! 
Elements is for hobbyists, not for professionals…
Greetings
Dorico costs c. $560. Exactly how long would one have to rent the software to pay that? How much do the proponents of this think people would pay (per month?) to use the software? At $50/month (assuming one rented consistently), one would pay for the software just in time to pay for the next upgrade.
This doesn’t sound like a worthwhile arrangement to me. Having folks buy outright seems a more stable model for Steinberg. Of course I’m not the one who would decide.
If a hobby is so unimportant to someone chooses not to spend $100 on it, maybe they don’t really need Dorico anyway. There are free alternatives.
It’s pretty hard to think of a hobby that would cost less than $100 a year if somebody was serious about it.
I don’t think it’s fair to compare Dorico, which has (presumably) thousands of purchases, with Microsoft Word or Adobe which has millions of purchases. I’ve been involved in single-use software, which costs 10s of 1000s of $$$$$ for one use! Anyway, we get into a mindset with software that it should be very cheap, but it depends on how many people you share the development costs with.
Sweetwater (USA) offers the possibilty for financing your purchase of Dorico 3 for $ 16 a month at 0 % interest for 36 months.
Maybe worth considering.
I just bought a Roland RD-2000 this way. Piece of cake.
So one will own Dorico 3 outright at about the time Dorico 6 is released?
(Then does one finance the c. $100 upgrade fee at $16/month over the next six or seven months?)
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Not something I would personally consider, but just mentioned as an option for the OP.
I upgraded to Dorico 3 pro a couple of weeks ago.
The rent-to-own option of Note Performer 3 works well for me though.
That’s very interesting. Sweetwater is a terrific store (super customer service), I have been buying stuff from them for many years. For for anyone who is considering Dorico but the initial purchase is too steep, this is an interesting option to look into.
And for the OP, if you happen to be a student, I’d also looking academic pricing.
https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/Dorico3P--steinberg-dorico-pro-3-scoring-software-download
I was completely serious. Buying essential software for just a few hundred bucks tops (it’s significantly less if you qualify for one or more of the discounts – educational, upgrade, crossgrade, etc.) should not be problematic for a professional composer. I don’t know anyone who’s a pro at his craft, who hasn’t managed to budget for the most basic tools of his trade, which usually come out to several thousands of dollars, minimum.
If you’re so strapped for cash that you’re a pro composer who can’t pay for his notation software, then frankly, you’ve got much bigger problems that need solving.
MiloDC,
Personally to me isn’t a problem to pay for Dorico Pro at once. But there are many people from Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin & South Americas, for whom it’s problematic.
I find Rent-To-Own much smarter way one to buy this fine piece of software. Most of us using more than one software + virtual instruments…
After all no one losing from Rent-To-Own… This will surely bring more costumers to Steinberg.
Greetings
The sellers lose from not having all the money up front.
They may also lose money from the hassle of processing multiple transactions (e.g. when customers forget that their credit card expired half way through the rental period, and the payments stop until they are chased up to fix the problem, or else the rental has to be cancelled).
They may also be losing money because of higher fees for more small transactions.
With Sweetwater’s own finance scheme for example, they simply recover those costs from the customer - the monthly payments add up to more than the one-off price, except for special promotions. For some of their finance deals they also pull a credit card reference, which may affect your credit score for other financial transactions.
What’s your source for this information? It seems to me that if they’re renting their computers to own (which I assume they’re doing; if they can’t afford to buy $500 software, then they certainly can’t afford a single payment for the hardware on which to run it), then they have some skill at reserving a certain amount of money each month. Why are they unable to apply that skill to saving up for a Pro copy of Dorico?
Again, if a professional cannot afford the most essentials instruments of his craft, then he has much more significant issues that need to be resolved. He should probably tackle them head-on, instead of attempting to find assorted ways to circumvent them.
If Steinberg isn’t doing subscriptions, then what is this “Dorico 365” that appears in the release notes for Dorico 3? The name sounds an awful lot like “Office 365”, which is Microsoft’s subscription office service.
This is just a guess, but perhaps the reason for the delay of the Dorico 3 trial is that it is actually going to be a Dorico 365 trial?
Thus far the only mention (that I can find) of Steinberg 365 licences is multi-seat educational licences for institutions: you get a permanent teacher licence and five 365-day licences that can be renewed as necessary. See https://www.steinberg.net/en/education/teachers/nuendo_7_educator.html for instance.
Regardless, this is a subscription, which is “rent”, not “rent to own”.