Fix and Flip Calculator — Real Project Profit, Not a Fantasy Number

The fix and flip calculator above gives you the number that actually matters on a house flip: net profit after every real cost, not just the gap between the after-repair value and the rehab bill. Enter the purchase price, the rehab budget, the ARV, how long you'll hold the property, and the financing and closing costs on both ends of the deal, and the calculator returns net profit, total project cost, ROI on the cash you invested, and annualized ROI so you can compare this flip against other uses of your capital.

Arb Digital built this fix and flip calculator because so many new investors underwrite a deal using "ARV minus purchase minus rehab" and call it profit — a shortcut that flatters every deal and sinks a shocking number of first-time flippers. The four cost buckets rookies routinely forget — holding costs, financing fees, buying closing costs, and selling closing costs — can easily eat 15 to 25 points of margin on a six-month project. This tool forces every one of them into the math before you fall in love with a property.

What This Fix and Flip Calculator Does

This is a full profit-and-loss model for a single-family flip, not a back-of-napkin estimate. It starts with your purchase price and rehab budget, adds in the carrying cost of owning the property for the months it takes to renovate and sell, layers in the closing costs you'll pay on the purchase, the closing costs and agent commission you'll pay on the sale, and any points or fees charged by your hard-money or bridge lender. Subtract all of that from the ARV and what's left is the honest net profit — the number a lender, a partner, or your own bank account will actually see at closing.

Because every input is editable, you can stress-test a deal in seconds: what happens if the rehab runs three months instead of two, if the ARV comes in 5% lower than your comp pull, or if you have to drop the price to sell in a slower market. Run those scenarios before you write an offer, not after you're three weeks into demolition.

How to Use It

1. Purchase price. The contracted price you're paying for the property, before any repair costs.
2. Rehab budget. Your full renovation estimate — materials, labor, permits, and a contingency line. Underestimating this single input is the most common cause of a flip that loses money.
3. After-repair value (ARV). What a licensed appraiser or a tight comp set says the finished home is worth. Pull this from recent, truly comparable sales — not listing prices, and not your own optimism.
4. Holding period. How many months from closing on the purchase to closing on the sale, including renovation time, listing time, and escrow.
5. Monthly holding costs. Property taxes, insurance, utilities, and loan interest, added together on a per-month basis.
6. Buying and selling closing costs. Enter each as a percentage — buying costs (title, recording, lender fees) typically run 1–3% of the purchase price; selling costs (agent commission, title, transfer tax) typically run 6–10% of sale price.
7. Financing points and fees. The origination points, underwriting fees, and draw fees a hard-money or private lender charges, expressed as a flat dollar figure.
8. Click Calculate Flip Profit to see net profit, total cost, ROI, and annualized ROI update instantly.

The Formula — How Flip Profit Is Actually Calculated

The full formula this fix and flip calculator applies is:

Net Profit = ARV − Purchase Price − Rehab Budget − Total Holding Costs − Buying Closing Costs − Selling Closing Costs − Financing Fees

Total holding costs are simply your monthly carrying cost multiplied by the number of months you hold the property. Buying closing costs are calculated as a percentage of the purchase price; selling closing costs are calculated as a percentage of the ARV, since that's the figure the commission and transfer taxes are actually based on at closing. ROI on cash invested divides net profit by the capital you actually put into the deal — purchase price, rehab, holding costs, and financing fees, since selling costs come out of sale proceeds rather than your own pocket going in. Annualized ROI takes that percentage and scales it to a 12-month basis, which is the only fair way to compare a six-month flip against a full-year investment like a rental property or the stock market. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau publishes detailed guidance on the closing costs buyers and sellers pay in a typical residential transaction, which is a useful sanity check on the percentages you enter here.

Why "ARV Minus Rehab" Is a Fantasy Number

Ask a first-time flipper what their profit will be and most will say some version of "the house will be worth $300,000, I'm paying $180,000, and rehab is $45,000 — so I'm making $75,000." That math ignores four cost categories that, on a typical six-month flip, quietly consume $20,000 to $40,000 of that imagined profit.

• Holding costs. Every month you own the property before it sells, you're paying property taxes, insurance, utilities, and — if you financed the purchase — loan interest. At $1,500 a month over six months, that's $9,000 gone before you ever list the house. Stretch the timeline to nine months because the rehab ran long, and holding costs alone can erase a five-figure chunk of profit.
• Financing points and fees. Hard-money and bridge lenders charge origination points — often 2 to 4 points of the loan amount — plus underwriting and draw fees. These are paid whether the flip goes well or not, and they rarely appear in a rookie's mental math at all.
• Buying closing costs. Title insurance, recording fees, and lender charges on the purchase side typically run 1–3% of the purchase price — real money that leaves your account at the first closing, long before any profit exists.
• Selling closing costs. This is the big one. Agent commissions alone are typically 5–6% of sale price, and when you add title fees, transfer taxes, and a buyer-concession allowance, total selling costs often land between 7% and 10% of the ARV. On a $300,000 sale, that's $21,000 to $30,000 — frequently larger than the entire rehab budget.

Add those four categories together on a typical deal and you'll usually find they total somewhere between 15% and 25% of the ARV. That's the gap between the fantasy profit number and the real one — and it's exactly the gap this calculator closes.

Reading Your ROI and Annualized ROI

Net profit tells you how much cash you'll walk away with, but it doesn't tell you whether the deal was a good use of your money. ROI on cash invested answers that by comparing profit to what you actually put at risk. A $40,000 profit on $150,000 of invested capital is a strong 27% return; the same $40,000 profit on $400,000 invested is a mediocre 10% return. The dollar figure is identical — the capital efficiency is not.

Annualized ROI takes this one step further by adjusting for time. A 15% ROI earned in three months is a dramatically better use of capital than the same 15% earned over eighteen months, because you can theoretically redeploy that capital into another deal four times faster. This calculator annualizes your ROI based on the holding period you enter, giving you a figure you can compare apples-to-apples against a rental's cash-on-cash return, a stock portfolio, or another flip with a different timeline.

Where Flips Actually Lose Money

Beyond the four hidden cost buckets, most unprofitable flips share a handful of root causes worth watching for specifically. Rehab budgets built without a licensed contractor's walkthrough routinely miss structural, electrical, or plumbing surprises hiding behind drywall. ARV estimates pulled from active listings rather than closed comparable sales tend to run optimistic, since list prices aren't the same as what buyers actually pay. Timelines that assume everything goes perfectly — permits approved on the first submission, no weather delays, a buyer under contract the week the home hits the market — rarely survive contact with reality, and every extra month is another month of holding costs eating into the margin this calculator shows you.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Skipping a rehab contingency. Add 10–20% to your contractor's estimate before entering it here; overruns are the norm, not the exception.
• Pulling ARV from listings instead of closed sales. Only sold comps within the last three to six months in the same neighborhood should set your ARV.
• Forgetting selling costs are based on ARV, not purchase price. An 8% selling cost on a $300,000 ARV is $24,000 — always larger than the same percentage applied to a lower purchase price.
• Ignoring the holding-period buffer. Budget for at least one extra month beyond your target timeline; permitting delays and slow buyer financing are common.
• Comparing flips only by dollar profit. Two deals with identical net profit can have very different ROI and annualized ROI depending on capital required and time held — always compare all three.

Related Free Tools From Arb Digital

Before you commit capital to a flip, run the deal through the 70% rule calculator for a fast go/no-go screen, and if you're weighing a flip against a buy-and-hold strategy, compare it with the rental property calculator, the cap rate calculator, and the BRRRR calculator for a refinance-and-hold exit. Browse the full free online tools hub for every real estate calculator Arb Digital offers.

Frequently Asked Questions

This tool provides general estimates for educational purposes only and is not financial, tax, legal, or medical advice. Figures are illustrative; consult a licensed professional for decisions.