The 70% rule in house flipping, worked through
The 70% rule says pay no more than 70% of ARV minus repairs. Where it comes from, the math on a real example, and what it does and doesn't cover.
Fix and flip, bridge and DSCR loans
Know your profit before the lender does
Price, rehab, ARV. The calculator adds points, interest, holding and selling costs and tells you what's left, then the lender table shows which lenders say they lend in your state.
Fix-and-flip calculator
Profit, cash in, return on cash and the 70% rule check, with the loan built the way hard-money lenders build it, ARV cap included.
Lenders compared by state
Starting rates, loan limits, credit floors and experience rules from 19 lenders' own websites, filtered to where they say they lend.
The 70% rule
Why a deal can fail the rule and still make money, worked through on a real example.
How hard money loans work
Loan to cost, ARV caps, draws, points and Dutch interest, with the numbers lenders publish.
DSCR loans for rentals
How the rent qualifies the loan, and what a lender means by a 0.75 minimum.
The number that kills flips is the one you didn’t count
On the calculator’s example, a house bought for $210,000 with $55,000 of work and sold for $340,000 looks like $75,000 on a napkin. The loan’s interest, points and fees take $18,241 of it, selling costs another $22,100, and holding and buying costs $9,400. What’s left is $25,259. The calculator counts all of them before you write the offer.
Lenders say different things in public
One lender publishes a 75% cap on after-repair value, another 80%, another 70%. One wants a 660 credit score, another 600. One requires a finished project in the last three years, another says no experience needed. The lender comparison puts their published terms side by side, read from each lender’s own site, and filters to the state your property is in.
Latest guides
DSCR loans for rental property: how the rent qualifies you
How DSCR lenders size a rental loan from rent instead of your income, what a 0.75 or 1.0 minimum means, and the terms 17 lenders publish.
How hard money and fix-and-flip loans work, with real terms
Loan to cost, rehab draws, ARV caps, points and Dutch interest, explained with the terms 18 lenders publish for flips, plus bridge loans.
Is house flipping still profitable? ATTOM's 2026 numbers
ATTOM's Q2 2026 report: 77,991 flips, a 21.5% typical gross return and $60,526 gross profit. What those figures leave out, and what they mean for your deal.
How house flips are taxed: short-term gains or business income
Flip profits are usually taxed at ordinary rates. When a flip is a short-term capital gain, when you're a dealer instead, and what the IRS says about each.
Questions people ask
Is Fix and Flip Loans a lender?
No. It's a calculator and a comparison of the terms lenders publish. No lender pays us, and you never pay us. If you send us a question about a deal, a person replies by email; we don't pass it to lenders.
What credit score do hard-money lenders want?
Among the lenders in our comparison that publish one, fix-and-flip minimums run from 600 to 660, and Anchor Loans raises its floor as high as 720 for borrowers with less recent experience. Several don't publish a minimum at all. The lender table quotes each one.
How much down payment does a fix-and-flip loan need?
The highest published tiers lend 90% to 100% of the purchase price plus 100% of the rehab in draws, but those usually go to experienced borrowers with strong credit; RCN Capital, for one, publishes 70% of purchase for someone with no flips. Every loan is also capped at a share of the after-repair value. Run your deal in the calculator to see your cash in.
Have a question?
Send it to Fix and Flip Loans and we will reply by email.