Help & User Guide

Look up this address

Type a property address above and click this button to pull live market-rent and current-value estimates for it, powered by RentCast. RentCast builds these from public county records, tax assessor data, and comparable-sales data — not the MLS — so treat them as a starting estimate, not an appraisal. Both fields still fill in with the looked-up numbers, and you can edit either one afterward if you have a better figure (a signed lease, a recent appraisal, your own comps). Results are cached for 30 days, so reopening a saved deal won’t trigger another lookup.

Market rent ($/month)

The monthly rent this property is expected to bring in. This is the starting point for every income figure on the results side — the monthly cash-flow table, NOI, and every return metric all trace back to this number.

Current value

The property’s current market value (typically the purchase price or appraised value). Used to calculate LTV, Cap Rate, and as the starting point for both projection charts further down the page.

Loan amount

The dollar amount being financed.

LTV (calculated)

Shown automatically right below Loan amount — loan amount ÷ current value. This isn’t something you type in; it updates live as either figure changes.

Interest rate

Drives the monthly mortgage payment directly, whichever Payment type is selected below.

Loan term (years)

Only matters when Payment type is set to Fully amortized — it’s the number of years the loan is scheduled to pay off over. Has no effect on an interest-only payment.

Payment type

Interest-only — the payment is just loan amount × interest rate ÷ 12; none of it reduces the loan balance. Fully amortized — a standard mortgage payment (principal + interest) that pays the loan down to $0 by the end of the loan term. Fully amortized always costs more per month than interest-only on the same loan, because part of every payment is going toward principal.

Origination fee

A one-time lender fee, entered as a percentage of the loan amount. Counted as part of your closing-cost cash requirement, not a monthly expense.

Rate buydown cost

What the lender quotes to buy down (lower) the interest rate by paying points upfront. This is entered manually — it’s not calculated from anything else, since it depends entirely on whatever your lender quotes for this specific loan. Defaults to $0.

Annual taxes, Annual insurance, Annual HOA dues

Flat annual costs. Each is divided by 12 to get its monthly figure in the Monthly Cash Flow table.

Management fee (% of rent)

A property management fee, charged as a percentage of market rent.

Vacancy (% of rent)

Expected income lost to vacancy, as a percentage of market rent. Reduces NOI the same way a real vacancy would.

Annual repairs, Annual utilities, Annual other expenses

Additional flat annual costs, each divided by 12 for the monthly table — same treatment as taxes and insurance above.

Four one-time, third-party costs due at closing: full appraisal, processing fee, closing fee, and title fees & insurance. These four are added together into “Estimated closing costs” on the results side.

Escrow deposit credit

Earnest money you’ve already paid, credited back to you at closing — enter it as a negative number (it reduces the cash you still need to bring). Defaults to −$1,500.

Seller financing concession

Any credit the seller is contributing toward your closing costs.

Years to project

How many years the appreciation table (and its bar-chart companion below) projects forward.

Rate columns

Each column header in the Appreciation Projection table is itself an editable rate — click into the number and type a new one, or use the × and + controls to remove or add a column. There can be as many or as few scenarios as you want.

Appreciation rate used

A single rate that drives the Net Equity Projection chart, kept separate from the Appreciation Projection table’s rate columns above (which can have several at once — the equity chart needs exactly one). Defaults to match the first appreciation column, but you can set it independently.

DSCR (the highlighted figure)

Debt Service Coverage Ratio — monthly NOI ÷ monthly mortgage payment. A DSCR of 1.51x means the property’s income covers the mortgage payment 1.51 times over. Most lenders look for at least 1.20–1.25x; below 1.0x means the property doesn’t generate enough income to cover its own debt service.

Return on Equity (Yr 1)

Annual cash flow ÷ equity injection (current value minus loan amount).

Cash-on-Cash Return (Yr 1)

Annual cash flow ÷ capital investment — equity injection plus closing costs, origination fee, and buydown, but excluding the 6-month liquidity reserve. That distinction matters: the reserve is cash that stays in the bank, not cash actually put into the deal, so including it in the denominator would understate your real return. With this tool’s default numbers:

Using the wrong denominator understates the return by roughly half a point — small-looking, but it compounds into a meaningfully different picture across a portfolio of deals.

Cap Rate

Annual NOI ÷ current value — a financing-independent measure of the property’s own yield.

Loan-to-Value, Equity Injection %

The same LTV shown inline in Loan Terms, plus its complement (equity ÷ current value). Between the two they always add up to 100%.

Rent, minus every expense line, equals Net Operating Income (NOI); NOI minus the mortgage payment equals Cash Flow. Every line has a monthly and an annual column (annual is just monthly × 12 — this tool doesn’t model seasonal variation).

Vacancy, Repairs, Utilities, Other

Each of these derives directly from its matching input above (Vacancy % × rent, or the relevant annual $ figure ÷ 12).

Mortgage Payment

Reflects whichever Payment type is currently selected in Loan Terms — interest-only or fully amortized. Switching that setting recalculates this line (and everything below it) immediately.

A ground-up estimate of the cash this deal requires: equity injection, origination fee, estimated closing costs, and the rate buydown, plus a 6-month reserve of mortgage payments held back as a cushion. “Capital investment” (bolded, partway down) is that same total before the reserve is added — it’s the figure Cash-on-Cash Return is measured against, for the reason explained above.

The actual cash due at the closing table — a different, usually smaller, number than “Total Liquidity Required” above it. The difference is the escrow deposit credit: this table nets in the earnest money you’ve already paid, since that cash doesn’t need to be brought again at closing. The underwriting total further up doesn’t know about the escrow credit at all — it’s a rougher, earlier-stage estimate. Both are correct; they’re just answering different questions.

Projects the property’s value forward, year by year, at each rate column you’ve set: value in a given year = current value ÷ (1 − rate) raised to that year’s power. Each year compounds on the year before it.

One bar per year: property value (from the appreciation rate set above) minus the remaining loan balance for that year. The loan balance itself depends on Payment type — interest-only loans never pay down, so the balance (and the bar height) grows purely from appreciation. Fully amortized loans pay down on schedule, so equity grows faster: from appreciation and from principal paid off.

DSCR (Debt Service Coverage Ratio)

NOI ÷ mortgage payment. Measures how comfortably the property’s income covers its own debt.

NOI (Net Operating Income)

Rent minus every operating expense, before the mortgage payment.

Cap Rate

Annual NOI ÷ current value — the property’s yield independent of how it’s financed.

LTV (Loan-to-Value)

Loan amount ÷ current value.

ROE (Return on Equity)

Annual cash flow ÷ equity injection.

Cash-on-Cash Return

Annual cash flow ÷ capital investment (see Key Metrics above for why this excludes the liquidity reserve).

Interest-only

A payment that covers interest only — the loan balance never goes down.

Fully amortized

A payment structured to pay the loan down to $0 by the end of its term.

Equity injection

Current value minus loan amount — the down payment.

Capital investment

Equity injection plus closing costs, origination fee, and buydown — excludes the 6-month reserve.

Net equity

Projected property value minus the remaining loan balance, for a given year.