Rental Property Calculator
Plug in a price and a rent, get the real math back. Free, no card, no email.
How to use it
You only need two numbers: the asking price and the rent the place should bring in each month. If the listing doesn’t show a rent, look at what similar units nearby are asking, or use the rent estimate on the listing as a starting point and check it against two or three comparable rentals. Open the advanced section if your down payment or rate is different from the defaults.
The math runs in your browser, so you can try as many properties as you like.
A worked example
Take a $150,000 house that rents for $1,450 a month, bought with 20% down ($30,000) on a 30-year loan at 7.0%. With closing costs, you put in about $34,500.
- Monthly mortgage payment (principal and interest): $798
- Monthly cash flow after taxes, insurance, vacancy, repairs and management: $209
- Cash-on-cash return: 7.3%
- Cap rate: 8.1%
- DSCR: 1.26
- 1% rule: rent is 0.97% of the price
A lower rate or a bigger down payment raises cash flow. Cash-on-cash can go up or down, because a bigger down payment also puts more cash into the deal. Cap rate stays the same, because it ignores the loan.
What the calculator assumes
Anything you don’t change uses these defaults. They’re deliberately cautious, and a local property manager or insurance quote will give you better figures for a specific address.
- Property tax: 1.10% of the price a year
- Insurance: 0.35% of the price a year
- Vacancy: 5% of rent
- Maintenance: 5% of rent
- Property management: 8% of rent
- Closing costs: 3% of the price
Property tax is the one most likely to be off. Rates run from about 0.4% in Alabama to over 2% in parts of Texas, Illinois and New Jersey, and a few hundred dollars a year in tax moves cash flow more than most buyers expect. If you’re buying from Canada, the Canadian investor guide covers the exchange rate and withholding costs this calculator leaves out.