What does a rental property actually return? Run the whole deal.
Price, financing, taxes, insurance, HOA, and rent go in — and this returns your monthly cash flow, cash-on-cash return, and the full cash you’d need to close, with Pennsylvania transfer tax figured from the actual county and municipality. Built to screen one property or twenty, on your own, without a spreadsheet or a sign-up.
A rental only works if the numbers work, and the numbers are more than rent minus mortgage. There’s the down payment, the closing costs, a full year of taxes and insurance collected up front, and the transfer tax — which in Pennsylvania swings by municipality. This runs the complete picture the way I’d run it for you: the real monthly carry, what it takes to get to the closing table, and the return on the cash you put in. Change the rent, change the price, try the next listing. It’s the same tool I use.
— Matt Mergo · NMLS #563819Monthly cash flow
From list price to real return.
The return on a rental comes down to two questions: what does it put in your pocket each month, and how much cash did it take to get there? This calculator answers both.
Cash-on-cash = Annual cash flow ÷ Total cash to close
PITIA is the full monthly carry — principal, interest, taxes, insurance, and HOA. The principal and interest come from your price, down payment, rate, and term; taxes, insurance, and HOA are added on top. That’s the number the rent has to beat.
Why the transfer tax has its own picker
Pennsylvania charges a realty transfer tax of 1% to the state plus a local rate set municipality by municipality. Most of the state runs 2% total, split 50/50 between buyer and seller — but the outliers are steep, and they change the cash-to-close meaningfully. This tool carries the verified county-and-municipality rates so the number is real, not a blended guess. For a deeper look at just that piece, the Pennsylvania transfer tax calculator breaks it down by every municipality that charges above the standard rate.
What the cash-on-cash number tells you
Cash-on-cash is the annual cash flow measured against the actual cash you sank in — down payment plus closing costs plus prepaids. It’s the honest yardstick for comparing one rental to another, or to leaving the money somewhere else entirely. A gross view (no reserves) shows the best case; turn on reserves for vacancy, maintenance, and management to see what a property realistically nets, which is almost always the number that should drive the decision.
This is an estimate to help you screen deals, not a quote or a Loan Estimate. Real financing depends on credit, the exact program, reserves, and the property — and investment properties price differently than a primary residence. If the deal pencils on debt-service coverage, the DSCR calculator runs that ratio directly, and DSCR investor loans explains how those loans actually work.
Send me the property and your rent number. I’ll run real financing on it.
Tell me the property, the projected rent, and how much you want to put down, and I’ll come back with actual numbers on both DSCR and conventional and tell you which one wins. No teaser rates, no funnel.