For more than 40 years, RealData has helped real estate investors and developers navigate the road to success.
Our mission is twofold: To supply the software tools you need to evaluate commercial, residential and mixed-use income-property investments, projects and partnerships; and to provide you with the educational materials and resources to be a knowledgeable investor.
You’ve seen the listing. It’s in a “hot” area, the agent says it “won’t last,” and the rent roll looks appealing. But before you take out your pen, or even think about negotiating, there’s one essential question:
Do the numbers really work?
Recently, I had the pleasure of being a guest on a podcast hosted by Asa Moran, a real estate student at the University of Alabama. Asa is one of a growing wave of bright, motivated students who are preparing to make their mark in the commercial real estate world.
As some of you know, I’m a big believer in supporting the next generation of investors.
During the podcast, we covered a lot of ground, from cash flow fundamentals to the nuances of value-add strategies.
At RealData, we’ve seen an uptick in interest about expense reimbursements, aka pass-throughs or recoverable expenses. If you’re in commercial real estate—whether as an investor, broker, property manager, or tenant rep—then you know that such reimbursements can make or break a deal. That’s why I’m giving away a FREE eBook: “Understanding Real Estate Expense Reimbursements.”
The new 2025 tax law keeps many of TCJA’s key provisions in place—some permanently, others with long-term extensions, and also brings a mix of permanent changes, updated incentives, and new planning opportunities
You receive an 1004 error “the number should be between 1 and 32767” when trying to print to paper. This error has been fixed in build 1.29 – you can login to your customer account and download the latest build of REIA Express. A workaround for this issue is to first print to PDF, then use your PDF to print to paper.
Internal Rate of Return (IRR) is the metric of choice for many, if not most, real estate investors. But there are a few issues with IRR that can cause you some vexation: If you expect a negative cash flow at some point in the future, then the IRR computation may simply fail to come up with a unique result; and with your positive cash flows, IRR may be a bit too optimistic about the rate at which you can reinvest them.
For these reasons, a variation on IRR, called Modified Internal Rate of Return (MIRR), can be a useful tool. Let’s see how it works, and see how it gives you the opportunity to deal with IRR’s shortcomings.
Internal Rate of Return (IRR) is arguably the most widely used metric in commercial real estate, and for good reason. It’s often called the gold standard for evaluating long-term investment performance. In this post, I’ll unpack what IRR really means, how to calculate it, where it excels, and where it doesn’t.
Most real estate investors learn about capitalization rate (cap rate) early on—and for good reason. It’s a useful, at-a-glance measure of a property’s income in relation to its market value.
But cap rate has its limitations: it reflects only a single year of net operating income (NOI), ignores financing, and says little about long-term performance. It looks at a property at a point in time, not over the long term.
If you’re serious about evaluating income-producing real estate—especially in a competitive or uncertain market—you need to go deeper. In this article, I’ll walk you through five advanced metrics that provide a more comprehensive and strategic view of a commercial investment’s potential. Ready for that deeper dive?
You’ve been watching the markets lately. How could you avoid it? You know the story: wild stock swings; headlines driving fear; nonstop chatter about tariffs, recession, interest rates, and global trade. It’s a jungle out there.
But amid all the noise, one thing hasn’t changed—and likely never will: real estate remains one of the smartest, most stable paths to building long-term wealth.
There is at least one concept in the U.S. tax system that is both very simple and really important, and yet I find that it is unfamiliar to many. And that concept is the marginal tax rate. What is it and why might it be important to you?
Internal Rate of Return (IRR) is a core metric for evaluating the profitability of income property investments. It is perhaps the one metric that accounts for the interplay between the magnitude and the timing of future cash flows.
From my experience, investors agree that a high rate of return is better than a low rate, but some are less clear about exactly what IRR is and how it’s calculated. So let’s start with some basics—and then dig deeper into levered and unlevered IRR.
I’ve just re-launched an updated version of my e-book, “10 Commandments for Real Estate Investors,” and you now can get it free on Amazon Kindle & Apple Books!
Real estate investing can be an excellent way to build wealth or to provide a cushion for your retirement; but it can also be a snare for those who lack preparation, planning, and realistic expectations.
In this brief series of essays, I guide you through some investment principles you can live by.