Know your ceiling price before you make an offer
Calculate the maximum allowable offer for flips, BRRRR, and rental properties. Enter your target returns, repair costs, and deal structure — the calculator works backwards to find the most you should pay.
Choose your strategy below. Results update instantly.
Max Allowable Offer
$173,000
Free — includes cash flow, DSCR, scenarios & reports
The approach depends on your investment strategy. Both work backwards from your target return to find the ceiling price.
Start with After Repair Value (ARV)
What the property will be worth after renovations.
Subtract all costs
Repairs, buying closing costs, selling costs & commissions, and holding costs for the rehab period.
Subtract your target profit
What's left is the most you can pay and still hit your return target.
Set your income targets
Choose your minimum cap rate and cash-on-cash return thresholds.
Reverse-engineer the price
The calculator finds the max price where both your cap rate and CoC targets are met.
Take the conservative answer
Uses the lower of the two approaches, then subtracts repair costs to get your max purchase price.
ARV − Costs − Repairs − Profit
After Repair Value minus all project costs, repairs, and your target profit margin.
ARV × 70% − Repairs
A rough flip filter. Our calculator gives a more precise MAO based on your actual costs.
min(NOI ÷ Cap Rate, CoC Price) − Repairs
The lower of cap-rate-derived and cash-on-cash-derived prices, minus rehab costs.
Most failed real estate investments share one thing in common: the investor paid too much. Calculating your maximum allowable offer before making a bid ensures every deal meets your return requirements — no matter how competitive the market gets.
Use for properties you plan to renovate and either resell or refinance. The ARV-based approach accounts for rehab timelines, holding costs during construction, and your target profit margin as a percentage of the after-repair value.
Use for rental properties where you care about ongoing income yield. The calculator reverse-engineers your max price from both cap rate and cash-on-cash return targets, factoring in financing terms to give you the most conservative (safe) answer.
MAO is the highest price you should pay for an investment property while still hitting your target return. It works backwards from your desired profit (flips) or income targets (rentals) and subtracts all costs — repairs, closing costs, and holding expenses — to find the ceiling price.
The 70% rule is a quick flip formula: MAO = ARV × 70% − Repair Costs. If a home’s after-repair value is $300K and it needs $40K in work, the 70% rule says pay no more than $170K. It’s a rough filter — our calculator gives you a more precise MAO based on your actual cost structure.
For buy-and-hold deals, the calculator reverse-engineers your maximum price from two angles: (1) what price gives you your target cap rate, and (2) what price gives you your target cash-on-cash return after financing. It uses the lower (more conservative) of the two as your MAO.
MAO is your ceiling, not your target. In competitive markets you may need to offer close to it, but ideally you negotiate below MAO to build in a margin of safety. The further below MAO you buy, the more profit buffer you have if costs run over or the market softens.
The flip calculation accounts for repair costs, buyer closing costs, seller closing costs and commissions, monthly holding costs (insurance, taxes, utilities, loan payments during rehab), and your target profit margin. All are subtracted from the after-repair value to find your max purchase price.
Explore other metrics with these focused investment tools.
Knowing your max price is step one. DealForge gives you full deal analysis with cash flow projections, DSCR calculations, scenario modeling, and lender-ready reports — all in one platform.
Create Free AccountFree to use — no credit card required