BRRRR Calculator

BRRRR stands for Buy, Rehab, Rent, Refinance, Repeat. The strategy lives or dies on one number: after you fix up the property and refinance it at its new value, how much of your own cash comes back out. A deal that recycles 100% of your capital leaves you owning the property with effectively none of your own money in it — and frees that cash up to do it again.

Enter the purchase price, rehab budget, after-repair value, refinance terms, and the post-rehab rent and expenses above. The calculator computes the cash you have left in the deal after refinancing, the share of your capital the refinance recycles, and the cash-on-cash return you earn once the new loan is in place. Everything runs in your browser — your numbers are never uploaded.

How the BRRRR math works

There are two cash stacks to keep straight. First, the total cash invested up front: the down payment (or full purchase price on an all-cash buy), purchase closing costs, and the rehab budget. Second, the refinance proceeds: the new loan, which is sized off the after-repair value (ARV), minus whatever you still owe on the original purchase loan and the refinance closing costs.

total cash invested = down payment + purchase closing costs + rehab
refinance loan = ARV × refinance LTV %
refi proceeds = refinance loan − original loan − refi closing costs
cash left in deal = total cash invested − refi proceeds

What “capital recycled” means

Capital recycled is the refinance proceeds as a percentage of the cash you put in. If you invested $90,000 and the refinance handed you $90,000 back, you recycled 100% — an “infinite return,” because you still own an appreciating, cash-flowing asset but have none of your own money tied up in it.

In practice most deals recycle 60–95%. That is still a strong outcome: you own the property with only a fraction of your cash at risk. Deals that recycle below ~40% tie up too much capital to be worth repeating, which is the whole point of BRRRR — the “Repeat” step needs the “Refinance” step to give your money back.

Post-refinance cash-on-cash

Once the new loan is in place, the property has to cash-flow against the refinanced debt service. The post-refi cash-on-cash is annual cash flow (NOI minus the new mortgage) divided by the cash you still have in the deal. When capital is fully recycled, this ratio is effectively infinite — which is the BRRRR ideal, but it also means the deal is highly leveraged and sensitive to vacancies or rate changes. Pair it with the cash-on-cash return calculator to sanity-check the leverage.

The assumptions that move BRRRR most

Three inputs dominate the outcome. ARV sets the refinance ceiling — overestimating it is the classic way a BRRRR deal fails to recycle capital. Refinance LTV (typically 70–80% of ARV) caps how much of that value you can pull out. And the rehab budget competes directly with the refinance proceeds for your cash: every dollar of rehab you overpay is a dollar not recycled. Stress-test all three before committing.

For the lender’s view of whether the refinanced property still qualifies on its own cash flow, run the same rent and new loan through the DSCR calculator. For the unlevered yield the ARV implies, use the cap rate calculator.

Frequently asked questions

What is the BRRRR method?

BRRRR is Buy, Rehab, Rent, Refinance, Repeat. You buy a distressed property, usually in cash; renovate it to raise its value and rent; rent it out; refinance the now-higher-value property to pull your original cash back out; then use that recycled cash to repeat the process on the next deal. The strategy succeeds when the refinance recycles most or all of the capital you put in.

What LTV do BRRRR refinances use?

Most lenders refinance at 70–80% of the after-repair value (ARV). The lower the LTV, the less cash you can pull out and the more of your capital stays tied up. This calculator defaults to 75%, which is typical for investment cash-out refinances.

Is a 100% capital recycle realistic?

It happens in strong deals where the ARV comes in well above purchase-plus-rehab and the LTV is generous, but it is not the norm. Most solid BRRRR deals recycle 60–95% of capital. Chasing exactly 100% can push investors to overestimate ARV or over-leverage — stress-test the inputs conservatively.

What if the refinance does not cover my rehab?

Then cash is still left in the deal and the post-refi cash-on-cash is measured against that remaining capital. It is not necessarily a bad investment, but it defeats the “Repeat” purpose: you cannot redeploy capital you have not recovered. Common fixes are a lower purchase price, a leaner rehab, a higher ARV, or a higher refinance LTV.

Does this calculator upload my data?

No. All calculations run locally in your browser. The inputs never leave your device — confirm it in your browser’s network tab while editing the fields.