Free House Flip Calculator (Excel)
What a fix-and-flip calculator needs vs a rental investment template
Flipping a house and holding it as a rental are two different deals with two different math problems. A rental underwriting sheet cares about ongoing cash flow, cap rate, and cash-on-cash return over years. A flip is a single, time-boxed project: buy, renovate, sell, and see what's left.
This calculator is built for that single-deal math — one property, one purchase, one exit, with every cost that eats into your profit between closing on the buy and closing on the sale. If you're underwriting a rental instead, the excel-template-for-real-estate-investment page covers NOI, cap rate, and cash-on-cash across up to three properties.
Rehab budget by category, not one lump number
Rehab costs are entered by category — kitchen and bathrooms, flooring and paint, roof/HVAC/systems, exterior and landscaping, plus a contingency line — so a rough number turns into an itemized budget instead of a single guess. The categories add up automatically into a total rehab figure that feeds the rest of the calculator.
Splitting rehab this way also makes it easier to sanity-check your numbers against contractor bids as they come in: if your kitchen and bath line is $8,000 and your contractor quotes $14,000, you see the gap before it blows up your margin, not after.
Holding costs, financing, and the selling side
Every month you hold the property costs money even if no work is happening — taxes, insurance, utilities — and this calculator multiplies your monthly holding cost by the number of months you expect to hold. Financing costs (loan interest over the hold period plus any points) are calculated the same way, based on the loan amount, rate, and points you enter.
On the sale side, commission percentage and seller closing costs come off the ARV before net profit is calculated, so the number you see reflects what you'd actually walk away with, not the sale price on paper.
Net profit, margin, ROI, and the 70% rule max offer
Once purchase price, rehab, holding, financing, and selling costs are in, the calculator rolls everything up into an all-in project cost, then net profit (ARV minus all-in cost minus selling costs), profit margin as a percentage of ARV, and ROI based on cash actually invested (accounting for your loan amount).
It also runs the 70% rule in reverse: enter your ARV and rehab total, and it tells you the maximum you should offer on the property so you don't overpay. It's a fast screening number, not a substitute for running the full deal — which is exactly what the rest of the sheet is for.
How to use it
- Enter the property, purchase price, ARV, and closing costs at purchase.
- Break your rehab budget into the five categories; the total rehab cost calculates automatically.
- Add your holding period, monthly holding costs, and loan terms (amount, rate, points).
- Enter your sales commission % and seller closing costs to see net profit, margin, ROI, and the 70% rule max offer.
Download the free Free House Flip Calculator (Excel)
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Real Estate Investor Pack
Once you've run the numbers on a flip, the Real Estate Investor Pack ($39) adds rental P&L with cash-on-cash and DSCR, amortization, and a proforma/CMA for when the exit is renting instead of selling.
See the full versionFrequently asked questions
Can I use this flip calculator in Google Sheets?
Yes. Upload the downloaded file to Google Drive, then open it and choose File > Save as Google Sheets. All the calculations keep working.
Is this calculator really free?
Yes. You give an email address to download it, and then it's yours to use with no further cost.
Does this replace a rental property underwriting spreadsheet?
No. This is built for a single buy-renovate-sell deal. For ongoing rental cash flow, cap rate, and cash-on-cash return across multiple properties, use the excel-template-for-real-estate-investment page instead.
What exactly is the 70% rule?
It's a quick screening formula: maximum offer equals 70% of ARV minus your estimated rehab cost. It's a shortcut real estate investors use to avoid overpaying, not a guarantee of profit — always run the full numbers on the rest of the sheet too.
Can I model more than one flip deal in the same file?
The free version is built around a single property. If you're evaluating multiple deals side by side or want post-purchase tracking across a portfolio, the real-estate-investor-pack is built for that.
Is this investment advice?
No. It's a planning and screening tool. Always verify your ARV and rehab estimates with a local agent, appraiser, and contractor before making an offer.