CURRENT POSITION
Strong rental cover
Expected rent comfortably exceeds the interest payment. Most BTL lenders look for at least 125–145% cover.
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Estimate your monthly UK mortgage payment, see the full repayment schedule, model overpayments, and stress test against rate rises.
Buy-to-let economics
£265
Monthly cashflow
LTV 75% · Break-even rent £935
Monthly cashflow: Rent − mortgage − bills − operating costs. The cash hitting your account each month, before tax.
Monthly rent: Your expected monthly rental income (annual rent ÷ 12). Use the gross figure before tax, voids, or letting fees.
Monthly interest: Monthly mortgage interest payment. BTL is typically interest-only — the loan balance doesn't reduce, but the monthly payment is lower than a repayment mortgage.
Monthly maintenance: BTL operating costs ÷ 12. Combines letting agent fee, voids, and the annual maintenance allowance. Excludes mortgage interest and standard bills.
LTV: Loan-to-value: mortgage ÷ property price. Most BTL products top out around 75–80% LTV; lower LTV usually unlocks better rates.
Break-even rent: The minimum monthly rent that covers every monthly cost (mortgage + bills + operating costs). Below this rent the property loses money before tax.
Returns
Strong — typical of higher-yield regions
Low <5% · Avg 5–7% · High 7–9%
Workable — depends on costs and tax
Low <4% · Avg 4–6% · High 6–8%
Low — marginal after mortgage
Low <2% · Avg 2–4% · High 4–6%
Workable — moderate return on cash
Low <5% · Avg 5–10% · High 10–15%
Yields and cashflow are before tax. Operating costs combine the letting agent fee, void allowance, and the maintenance allowance you set.For this estimate, buy-to-let is modelled using England and Northern Ireland additional-property rates. First-time buyer relief is for a property you intend to occupy as your main residence, so it does not apply to a buy-to-let purchase.
BUY-TO-LET ECONOMICS
Position
Monthly rent
£1,200
Monthly cashflow
£265
Monthly maintenance
£316
Monthly interest
£619
LTV
75%
Break-even rent
£935
Returns
Gross yield
8%
Strong — typical of higher-yield regions
Low <5% · Avg 5–7% · High 7–9%
Cap rate
5.89%
Workable — depends on costs and tax
Low <4% · Avg 4–6% · High 6–8%
Net yield
1.77%
Low — marginal after mortgage
Low <2% · Avg 2–4% · High 4–6%
Cash-on-cash
5.77%
Workable — moderate return on cash
Low <5% · Avg 5–10% · High 10–15%
Yields and cashflow are before tax. Operating costs combine the letting agent fee, void allowance, and the maintenance allowance you set.For this estimate, buy-to-let is modelled using England and Northern Ireland additional-property rates. First-time buyer relief is for a property you intend to occupy as your main residence, so it does not apply to a buy-to-let purchase.
YOUR NUMBERS
Mortgage type
CURRENT POSITION
Expected rent comfortably exceeds the interest payment. Most BTL lenders look for at least 125–145% cover.
NEXT BEST MOVE
Strong cover on the calculator doesn't account for tax, voids, or letting fees — keep a realistic buffer.
Where to go next
See how prepared you are across deposit, surplus, and the binary readiness factors.
Open readiness summaryHow to read these numbers
You are at 75% LTV or below. This is a stronger buy-to-let position and is often closer to where many mainstream BTL products sit.
Rental cover is above 145%. That is stronger than many common rental cover thresholds and may give more room in the calculation.
Excludes tax, voids, letting fees, insurance, licensing, repairs, legal costs and lender stress testing.
Owning a rental costs more than the mortgage payment. This calculator covers the figures that drive a buy-to-let’s return — but it doesn’t capture every cost of running the property.
Includes
Does not include
Four levers do most of the work on the figures above. Get these right and the rest follows.
Market rent and how many weeks the property sits empty drive every other figure. Two void weeks a year is a sensible default; problem stock can run higher.
Agent fees (often 10–15% of rent) and a maintenance budget (typically ~1% of property value per year) are the two recurring deductions that erode gross yield into net yield.
The 5% additional-property surcharge raises your total cash in and lowers break-even gross yield. A higher purchase price spreads fixed costs but lowers yield.
BTL mortgages are usually interest-only, so rate moves cashflow not capital reduction. A 1% rate rise reduces monthly cashflow by ~£167 on a £200k loan.
Yield benchmarks vary by region, but the bands below are a useful sanity check on whether the deal stacks up before you factor in finance and tax:
Yield figures here are before income tax, capital gains tax, and section-24 mortgage interest restrictions. Real after-tax returns depend on your tax band and ownership structure.
Want the full picture?
The mortgage calculator above models payment for a price you choose. The Affordability check answers the other half: how much a UK lender will actually lend you based on income, deposit, and outgoings — including the standard lender stress test.
Tie this check to your full plan
The Buyer Planner connects Affordability Stress Test, Document Readiness, and Conveyancing Dashboard — turning this snapshot into a tracked plan you can return to.
A focused mortgage repayment calculator for UK first-time buyers. Enter the loan, rate, and term to estimate the monthly payment. Add overpayments to see how they cut total interest. Toggle the stress test to preview what happens if rates rise.
This is the mortgage payment calculator. For how much you can actually borrow from a UK lender (based on income, deposit and outgoings, with the lender stress test built in), use the Affordability check. For stamp duty, use the Stamp duty calculator. For the full one-off and monthly costs of buying, use the buying costs planner. To see all of these for one house you have in mind, use Can I afford this house?.
The most-asked questions UK first-time buyers ask about mortgage payment calculations.
On a repayment mortgage, your monthly payment covers both interest and capital so the loan reduces to zero by the end of the term. The formula compounds the rate monthly over the term. On an interest-only mortgage you only pay the interest each month — the capital remains owed until the end of the term. Most UK residential mortgages are repayment; interest-only is more common in buy-to-let.
Repayment pays off both interest and capital, so by the end of the term the loan is gone. Interest-only pays only the interest each month — the original loan remains outstanding at the end of the term, and you need a separate plan to repay it (sale of the property, savings, investments). Residential first-time buyer mortgages are almost always repayment; interest-only is more typical for buy-to-let or specialist circumstances.
When you apply for a UK mortgage, lenders check you can afford the payments not just at today's rate but at a notionally higher 'stressed' rate (commonly your offered rate plus 1-3 percentage points). The Bank of England requires this. This calculator's stress test lets you preview what your payment would look like if rates rose, so you know what you'd actually be signing up for if rates moved.
Mortgage rates vary with the Bank of England base rate, your loan-to-value (LTV), and your credit profile. Higher deposits (60% or 75% LTV) usually get better rates than 90% or 95% LTV. Two-year fixes tend to be lower than five-year fixes when rates are expected to fall, and the opposite when rates are expected to rise. Compare rates across lenders — a 0.25% difference compounds substantially over a 25-30 year term.
Overpayments come off the capital balance, so future months calculate interest on a smaller principal. Even small regular overpayments save thousands over a 25-30 year term. Most UK lenders let you overpay 10% of the balance each year without early-repayment charges; check your specific deal's terms.
Lower LTV (bigger deposit relative to property price) gets you better rates and more lender options. The standard LTV bands are 60%, 75%, 80%, 85%, 90% and 95%. Each step up in deposit (so each step DOWN in LTV) tends to unlock cheaper rates. Below 60% LTV the rate improvements flatten — at that point a bigger deposit is more about reducing borrowing than reducing rate.
Longer terms reduce the monthly payment but increase total interest over the life of the loan. 25 years was the historic default; 30 and 35-year terms have become more common as house-price-to-income ratios have risen. Pick a term where the monthly payment leaves you comfortable headroom for life events. You can usually overpay or remortgage onto a shorter term later if your income grows.
No — this is the mortgage repayment calculator. For stamp duty (SDLT) estimates use the dedicated UK stamp duty calculator. For one-off costs (solicitor fees, surveys, Land Registry, moving) use the buying costs planner.
No. This is an estimator to help you plan and compare scenarios. An actual mortgage offer comes from a lender after a full affordability check, credit check, and property valuation.