Cash-on-cash calculator — your return on the cash you actually put in.
Cash-on-cash divides the year's cash flow by every dollar it took to get the keys — down payment, closing costs, and rehab, not just the down payment. Both sides of that division are derived in the open below.
Every figure above is computed by the same audited engine that powers BuyBox — audited against industry-standard real-estate math. Estimates, not investment advice.
This is one metric. BuyBox runs the whole underwrite — verdict in about 30 seconds.
Why cash-on-cash uses the whole cash stack
The most common way this metric gets flattered is quietly shrinking the denominator: dividing by the down payment alone while closing costs and rehab sit outside the formula. A 20%-down deal with 3% closing costs and a modest rehab can easily need 30–40% more cash than the down payment — and the honest return is that much lower. This calculator itemizes every dollar in, so the denominator is the cash it actually took.
Cash-on-cash is a year-one, cash-only lens: it ignores principal paydown, appreciation, and taxes. That's a feature — it answers "what does my invested cash earn me in spendable dollars?" — but it's one lens among several. The cash-on-cash help article covers where it fits alongside cap rate and DSCR.