Rent or buy a home
Compare renting against buying with the transaction costs included, which is where most versions of this comparison quietly go wrong.
Runs entirely in your browserRuns entirely on your device — nothing you type is sent anywhere. Educational only, and not investment advice.
How to use this calculator
Each step names a control you will find on screen above.
- Property price and Monthly rent for the same home
It must be the same home, or a genuinely comparable one. Comparing a bought 3BHK against a rented 1BHK answers nothing.
- Down payment, Home loan rate and Loan tenure
The financing. The down payment is the money that stops compounding elsewhere, and that opportunity cost is half the comparison.
- Property appreciation
Be careful here. Indian residential property has delivered far less than most people assume over the last decade — try 5% before you try 10%.
- Read the upfront costs line
Stamp duty and registration run to 5–8% depending on the state, and they are gone the moment you sign. This is the line most comparisons omit.
Worked example: An ₹80 lakh flat against ₹22,000 rent
An ₹80 lakh property with a 20% down payment, a 20-year loan at 8.5%, against renting the same home for ₹22,000 a month.
What to enter
- Property price
- ₹80,00,000
- Monthly rent for the same home
- ₹22,000
- Down payment
- ₹16,00,000
- Home loan rate
- 8.5%
- Loan tenure
- 20 years
- Property appreciation
- 5%
What it shows you
- Loan amount
- ₹64,00,000
- EMI
- ≈ ₹55,546
- Stamp duty & registration
- ≈ ₹5.6 lakh
- Total upfront
- ≈ ₹21.6 lakh
- Rent yield on this flat
- 3.3%
- Monthly gap, EMI vs rent
- ≈ ₹33,500
roughly 7%, gone immediately
₹2.64 lakh a year on ₹80 lakh
Where this is taught
A calculator gives you a number. These explain what the number means and when it misleads you.
- Market Basics13 minRent or buy: the comparison done honestlyMost versions of this argument compare an EMI with a rent. The real comparison is between two portfolios — and it turns on costs nobody puts in the spreadsheet.
- Risk & Psychology14 minThe pull of a second propertyProperty is the one asset that never shows you a red day. Why that changes how risky it feels, and how to compare it with a portfolio on the same terms.
- Risk & Psychology11 minPrepay the home loan or invest?The most common financial question in India, worked through properly — including the tax regime detail that changes the answer.
- Market Basics11 minWhich loans to clear before you invest a rupeeClearing a 42% credit card is a guaranteed, tax-free 42% return. Clearing an 8.5% home loan usually is not. The order matters more than the effort.
- Market Basics11 minActually starting: your first portfolioA concrete, defensible way to begin — what to buy first, how much, in what order, and the mistakes that make the first year unnecessarily expensive.