Exit Strategy Decision Tool

Most investors decide the exit before they run the numbers. A wholesaler assigns a deal that would have cleared six figures as a flip. A flipper sells a house that would have refinanced to zero cash left in and paid rent for a decade. The strategy was chosen by habit, and the spreadsheet, if there was one, only ever modeled that strategy.

This workbook runs all five at once from a single input sheet. On the Inputs tab you enter the property numbers one time: after-repair value, purchase price, repair estimate, buy-side closing percent, sell-side cost percent, market rent, vacancy, monthly operating expenses, plus the financing assumptions for each exit (refinance LTV and rate for BRRRR, conventional down payment for a hold, flip holding and finance cost, your wholesale contract price, and the seller-finance premium, down payment, rate, and term). The Comparison tab returns a five-row table with cash required, profit, ROI on cash, and a realistic timeline for each strategy. Wholesale profit follows the 70 percent rule (ARV times 70 percent minus repairs minus your contract price). BRRRR and Buy and Hold profit are equity captured plus year-one cash flow after a PMT-based mortgage payment. Seller finance profit is the down payment plus the full note payments minus your all-in cost. A BEST ROI flag marks the highest return on cash, a bottom row names the highest total profit, and two conditional-formatting rules shade the best-ROI row green and the highest-profit row amber so the gap between the two is visible at a glance. The Decision Guide tab is a plain-language page on how to read the table honestly: why wholesale ROI looks absurd, when each exit tends to win, the Dodd-Frank note for owner-occupant seller financing, and three sanity checks before you commit. 22 formulas, no macros.

You come away knowing which exit the deal itself favors and how far apart the alternatives are, which is usually the real decision. To start, fill the yellow cells on Inputs with your ARV, price, and repairs, add rent and expenses if you might hold, set your contract price if you might assign, then read the Comparison tab and the Decision Guide. Re-run it with the ARV cut by ten percent before you write the offer.