When you say exit-intent, do you mean the pop-up at the beginning of the page, or the bottom of the page one? I'm much less bothered by the latter because it's less counter-intuitive to me, and it doesn't get in the way of me reading the content. If that's what you meant, what's your take on the former?
That said, I know that pop-ups work. That does not make them less irritating to all of those people who like to know what they sign up for before actually writing their email address there (the pop-upon-loading one). 42% more of 2% still annoys a large chunk of the 97% left.