Good advice, and one that will be pursued.
Ideally, it makes more sense to get a loan, buy the equipment outright, then pay off the loan at a reasonable rate. The lease is only attractive in that there is less risk for the company providing the lease, however it costs the end user more. With minimal personal assets to put up against a loan, this a traditional business loan will be hard to procure. Any advice there during your journey to get financed through a bank?