Free tool
Rental yield calculator: gross, net, and what your cash is really earning
Gross yield is what the listing says. Net yield is what the property earns once voids, fees and running costs come off. Cash-on-cash is what the money you put in is earning after the mortgage. Type the figures and see all three, then send the link to whoever needs convincing.
The achievable figure, not the top of the listing range.
- Gross yield
- 6.9%
- Net yield
- 5.2%
- Cash-on-cash
- 4.3%
- Monthly cashflow
- £212
Letting costs take 24% of the rent before the mortgage. Break-even rent is £904 a month — 21% of headroom.
The year, line by line
- Rent for the year
- £13,800
- Voids (4%)
- −£552
- Agent (10% of collected)
- −£1,325
- Running costs
- −£1,500
- Net operating income
- £10,423
- Mortgage interest (5.25%)
- −£7,875
- Pre-tax cashflow
- £2,548
- Cash invested
- £59,500
If the rent or the price moves
Net yield, and cash-on-cash in brackets, for ±10% on each.
| Rent \ Price | -10% | £200,000 | +10% |
|---|---|---|---|
| -10% | 5.1% (3.4%) | 4.6% (2.3%) | 4.2% (1.7%) |
| £1,150/mo | 5.8% (6.5%) | 5.2% (4.3%) | 4.7% (3.2%) |
| +10% | 6.5% (9.5%) | 5.8% (6.3%) | 5.3% (4.7%) |
Three yields, three questions
Gross yield is the listing's number
Rent over price. It ignores that a tenant will leave, an agent will charge, a boiler will fail and the freeholder will send a bill. Two properties with the same gross yield can have very different net figures, and the difference is usually the service charge.
Net yield is the property's number
What is left after the costs of letting, over the price. It is the figure to compare between properties, because it is honest about a flat with a £2,400 service charge and a house with none.
Cash-on-cash is your number
Cashflow after the mortgage over the cash you put in. Borrowing more at a rate below the net yield raises it; borrowing at a rate above the net yield lowers it, and the monthly cashflow line goes red. The sensitivity table shows how far the rent or the price can move before that happens.
What to put in the costs
Purchase costs are stamp duty at the additional-property rate, conveyancing, the survey, and any mortgage arrangement fee you pay rather than add to the loan. They are cash in, so they count against the cash-on-cash return but not against yield.
Running costs are what letting costs whether or not anything goes wrong: landlord insurance, the annual gas safety check, the electrical report every five years averaged out, an allowance for repairs, and on a leasehold flat the service charge and ground rent — usually the largest line and the one most often left out. Add a licence fee if the property is in a selective or HMO licensing area, and from December 2026 the £65 PRS database registration for a property in England.
Voids are the weeks a year the property is empty between tenants. Two weeks a year is roughly 4%; a property that turns over every year with a fortnight's gap is that, and one with a long-term tenant is close to nothing.
Where it sits
Pre-tax, and interest-only. Tax is where the answer changes most for an individual landlord since Section 24, and the stress test calculator does it properly; a repayment mortgage moves cash into equity rather than losing it, which cashflow alone does not show. Stamp duty is an input, not a calculation, because the rate depends on your circumstances — GOV.UK's calculator gives the figure.
Nothing is stored and nothing is sent. The inputs sit in the page address so the result can be shared; there is no account and no record. This is a calculation, not advice on whether to buy.
LetBuddy holds the rent that actually arrived and the expenses that actually went out, per property and in HMRC's categories — so a year in, the yield you achieved is a report rather than an estimate, and the figures for the next purchase come from the last one.
Common questions
How do you calculate rental yield?
Gross yield is a year's rent divided by the purchase price, as a percentage: £1,150 a month is £13,800 a year, which on a £200,000 property is 6.9%. Net yield takes off the costs of letting first — voids, the agent's fee, insurance, maintenance, certificates, any service charge — and divides what is left by the price. The gap between the two is what the gross figure hides.
What is a good rental yield in the UK?
It depends on where the property is and what money costs. The useful comparison is not a national average but your own mortgage rate: a net yield below the interest rate on the loan means the property costs you money each month before tax, whatever the gross figure says. Yields tend to be higher where prices are lower relative to rents, and lower in the most expensive areas, where the return comes from price growth rather than income.
What is cash-on-cash return?
The year's pre-tax cashflow — rent less voids, fees, costs and mortgage interest — divided by the cash you actually put in: the deposit, the buying costs and any refurbishment. It answers a different question from yield: not what the property earns, but what your money earns. A property with a modest net yield can have a high cash-on-cash return if the mortgage is large and cheap, and a poor one if it is large and expensive.
Should yield include the mortgage?
Gross and net yield do not; they describe the property. Cash-on-cash does; it describes your investment. This calculator shows all three, and the monthly cashflow after interest, so you can see which figure is telling you what.
Does this include tax?
No. Everything here is before tax. Since Section 24, an individual landlord is taxed on profit before mortgage interest and given a 20% credit, which can turn a positive cashflow into a loss for a higher-rate taxpayer. The buy-to-let stress test calculator on this site works that through, including the company comparison; run your figures there next.
Is anything I type stored?
No. The calculation runs in your browser. The figures are written into the page's address so you can copy a link to them — that is the only place they go, and it is why the calculator does not ask for an address.
See the yield you actually achieved
Your first property is free, permanently. The ledger shows the rent that arrived, the expenses sit in HMRC's categories, and the year's figures are the estimate's answer.
Your first property is free forever. No card required.
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