People assume buying always beats renting. Over a twelve-month hold that is frequently false, and the reason is not obvious. Enter a property below and see the real return, the resale price you'd need just to break even, your maximum offer — and an honest comparison against renting the same year.
Purchase price, renovation budget, what you think it resells for, and what comparable rent costs. Eight numbers.
Return on cost as an investment, and total cost of owning versus renting as a housing decision. They often disagree.
Keep a comparison list, send a link that opens with your exact numbers, or save a clean PDF.
Closing-cost defaults are set for Tennessee. Everything that matters is editable under Advanced.
These costs are gone no matter what happens. Only the renovation spread gives money back.
| If it sells for | Per SF | Profit | Return on cost | Cost of owning | Better |
|---|
Separate from the housing question: judged purely as a deal, is it worth doing?
of capital tied up until it sells.
a refundable deposit. Nothing else at risk.
Most rent-versus-buy math compares a mortgage payment to a rent payment. Over a short hold that comparison is close to meaningless, because it ignores the two costs that actually decide the question: the round trip of transaction costs, and what your capital gives up while it sits in a house.
This tool counts both. On the buy side it adds transfer tax, settlement, inspection and lender fees going in; HOA, taxes, insurance, utilities and maintenance every month you own it; commission, title, settlement and buyer concessions going out; and a charge for the return your money stops earning. On the rent side it counts rent, renter's insurance, utilities, any water and trash billed back to you, application fees, and the interest your deposit gives up.
Then it does something most calculators skip: it separates the two questions people conflate. Is this a good investment? — return on cost, break-even resale, maximum offer. And is it better than renting? — total economic cost of each, since you have to live somewhere either way. Those two answers frequently disagree, and the disagreement is the useful part. A deal returning three percent is a poor investment and can still beat writing rent checks.
Your resale price. Every other number is knowable within a few thousand dollars; the resale is a forecast, and it moves the answer more than everything else combined. This calculator takes your number and shows what it implies — it cannot tell you whether it is achievable. That means pulling closed sales of comparable renovated properties nearby. Not active listings, which are opinions, and not a neighborhood average price per square foot, which hides the difference between a renovated house and a dated one.
The most useful output here is the break-even resale price. Compare it against the highest price the street or building has actually produced. When break-even sits above the record, the deal needs a lower purchase price, not a bigger renovation.
Usually not, over a short hold. Buying carries costs that vanish just as completely as rent — closing costs in, carrying costs while you own it, commission and closing costs out, and the return your down payment stops earning. On a twelve-month hold those often add up to more than a year of rent. Buying wins when the renovation creates more value than that friction consumes, which is a bet, not a given. The calculator shows you both totals side by side.
For the federal primary-residence exclusion you generally need to have owned and lived in the home for at least two of the previous five years. A twelve-month hold does not qualify. Separately, holding more than twelve months moves any gain from short-term rates to long-term capital gain rates. If your plan is close to a year, the difference between month eleven and month thirteen is worth a conversation with your CPA before you set the timeline.
What the money would otherwise be doing. If it is sitting in a money market, use that yield. If it is already committed to something else and buying this property means borrowing to replace it, use the rate you would actually borrow at — often a home equity line, and much higher. That choice routinely changes the verdict, so it is worth getting right rather than leaving at the default.
Because a "cosmetic refresh" that includes a kitchen and two bathrooms is not cosmetic. In most markets a mid-grade kitchen alone runs thirty to forty thousand dollars and each bathroom eighteen to twenty-five. If your budget divided by square footage lands under about fifty-five dollars, the calculator flags it — not because it knows your contractor, but because that number is where most first drafts turn out to be light.
Enter a percentage in the Financing box and the calculator answers it directly — it runs your deal at all cash, 50, 65, 75 and 80 percent financed and shows profit, return on your cash, and profit after charging your own money what it would otherwise earn. That last column is the honest comparison, because paying cash ties up far more money than borrowing does.
The rule underneath it: financing helps when you are borrowing below what the project returns unlevered. If a deal returns four percent on cost and the mortgage costs six and a half, leverage shrinks your profit instead of magnifying it. The exception is when your cash is already committed elsewhere and buying with it means borrowing at a higher rate anyway — then financing at the lower rate is worth it even without the returns spread, because you are protecting liquidity rather than chasing yield.
No. The calculation runs entirely in your browser and nothing is sent anywhere. Properties you save are stored in your own browser only — there is no account and no database. A shareable link carries your numbers inside the link itself, which is why the links are long. If you choose to give an email for a PDF copy, that is the only thing that ever leaves your device, and it is optional.
Everything you've run, side by side. Stored in this browser only — nothing is uploaded.
Optional. Your browser's print dialog opens either way — pick "Save as PDF" as the destination.
One email with your analysis. No list, no newsletter, no sharing it with anyone.