BRRRR Deal Lab
Jump to a tool
The Three Quick Filters
Three screens — the 75% Rule, the 1% Rule, and the book's Napkin Method — eliminate bad deals in under a minute. The 75% rule asks whether the all-in cost will let you recover all your capital at refinance. The 1% rule asks whether the rent is high enough to likely cash-flow. The Napkin Method runs a five-input estimate on monthly profit. Drag the sliders to test a deal you're looking at.
The book identifies three sources of distress that produce good deals. Most BRRRR investors live in property distress — it's the easiest to find and the most within your control.
Rehab Planner with Upgrade Hacking
Every dollar in a rehab should be earning its keep. The book's mindset for this is upgrade hacking: marry an understanding of how properties are appraised with an understanding of what materials actually cost, and you can make a property worth a lot more for a lot less money. Toggle scope items below, choose Standard or Upgrade Hack, and the running totals show you what the project costs and what it adds to the appraisal.
For each area, choose Skip, the Standard fix, or the book's Upgrade hack. Every option shows what it costs and the appraisal value it adds — the hack usually buys more value per dollar.
The fastest path to higher value isn't more granite — it's more bedrooms, more bathrooms, and more square footage. Pick a scope item to see the book's specific advice.
BRRRR vs. Traditional — Ten Years In
The single most important idea in the book is the velocity of money — how many times the same source of capital can work for you. The book illustrates this with two investors, Mike and Tom, starting with identical capital. Mike executes BRRRR; Tom buys with a 25% down payment and holds. Ten years later, Mike's return on invested capital is ~71% and Tom's is ~14%. This is the same comparison, run on your numbers.
Net worth = equity in properties + cash on hand. Equity grows from the BRRRR margin (ARV − all-in), from principal pay-down, and from appreciation. The Traditional path puts 25% down per deal and buys again only when enough cash flow + new capital has accumulated. The BRRRR path pays cash, refinances at the LTV slider, recovers the cash-out, and buys again — every cycle-time-in-months. Simplified math: it ignores closing costs, taxes, vacancy, and seasoning to keep the comparison focused on the velocity mechanism the book is making the case for.
With these numbers, at year 10 the BRRRR investor owns more properties, has more net worth, and collects more monthly cash flow than the traditional investor — for the same starting capital. That gap is the velocity of money, made visible.
Lender Comparison Workbench
The book is emphatic: get pre-approved with at least two lenders and compare them line by line. The lender quoting a lower rate may bury fees in closing costs; the lender lending against cost instead of value may lock up most of your capital. Paste in two quotes and the workbench surfaces every dimension that matters — and flags the red flags the book warns about.
- No red flags yet. Drag sliders to test.
Adjust the sliders to compare two lenders.
Capital recovered assumes a fixed example deal: $180,000 all-in, $240,000 ARV. The lender's LTV is applied to the ARV; minus their closing costs gives net cash returned. Monthly P&I uses a 30-year amortization on the borrowed amount at the lender's quoted rate. "Capital locked up" equals the seasoning period — how many months you wait before the refinance is allowed.