Back-Of-The-Envelope (BOE) Analysis

by Joe Stampone on February 10, 2010

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Early on in the real estate game it’s important to manage your time effectively. This is made much easier by an approach referred to as back-of-the-envelope analysis (BOE). In many cases, back-of-the-envelope analysis is all you need at assess a particular real estate opportunity. The trend in real estate has been toward more sophisticated quantitative analyses on excel where one can look at multiple scenarios, calculate potential returns based on each of those scenarios, and keep track of what has happened over the long-term.

However, the BOE approach is still valuable in initially analyzing opportunities. Like Poorvu says, it’s like Grandmother throwing together her chicken soup with no discernible recipe. Like Grandmother’s soup, the BOE analyses employed by real estate professionals almost always perform as expected.

Bruce Kirsch of Real Estate Financial Modeling offers free back-of-the-envelope models on his site to let you know in 60 seconds if a transaction is worth further analysis. They apply to ground-up developments and distressed or foreclosed development project acquisitions.  Play around with the excel models here or download the files below.

Apartment BOE Model

Office/Industrial BOE Model

How do you initially assess a real estate opportunity?

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  • http://twitter.com/marcojelli Marcus J. Ellison

    Thanks for the post.

    I think it would be interesting (and much more useful) if the Pro-Forma's were web-based and plugged into real time market realities.

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  • http://www.astudentoftherealestategame.com/ Joe Stampone

    Marcus, thanks for your comment. I agree, that would be much more useful, of course real time market realities vary by location and property type.

  • Fberfle

    There’s a great app (call Back of the Envelope, actually!) that does this on iPhone and Blackberry. http://www.realestateboe.com. Might be worth a look.

  • http://www.astudentoftherealestategame.com/ Joe Stampone

    Thanks for the suggestion. I’ve actually spoken with the Razak Company (the developers) about the app and had a chance to play around with it.

    I still like being able to play with the numbers on excel, but it’s a great alternative when you’re on the go.

    Thanks for your comment!