About RentvsBuy

The question of whether to rent or buy a home is one of the most consequential financial decisions most people will ever make — often involving hundreds of thousands of pounds or dollars, decades of commitment, and enormous personal trade-offs. Yet most of the "calculators" available online are either hopelessly oversimplified or subtly biased towards buying (often because they're run by mortgage lenders or estate agent platforms with a financial interest in encouraging purchases).

RentvsBuy was built to fix that. We wanted a calculator that was genuinely comprehensive — one that accounts for every real cost of homeownership on both sides of the Atlantic: stamp duty in the UK, state-level property taxes across all 50 US states, HOA fees, Private Mortgage Insurance, homeowners insurance, maintenance, selling costs, and the opportunity cost of the deposit. We also wanted it to be completely free, with no registration required, no upsells, and no agenda.

The result is what we believe is the most detailed free rent vs buy calculator available for UK and US users. Enter your numbers, get an honest answer, and decide for yourself.

The idea for this tool came from personal frustration. When we were trying to decide whether to buy our first properties, we found the available calculators deeply unsatisfying. Some only compared mortgage payments to rent, completely ignoring transaction costs, maintenance, and opportunity cost. Others were buried in assumptions we couldn't change. A few seemed designed to steer us towards buying regardless of the numbers.

We have backgrounds spanning financial analysis, software development, and property research. Between us, we have bought and rented in London, the South East, and several US cities — and we understand intimately how different the calculation looks depending on where you are and what your personal circumstances are. A first-time buyer in Manchester faces a completely different rent vs buy equation than a renter in Austin, Texas, and we wanted a tool sophisticated enough to reflect that.

The data behind the calculator is sourced from authoritative public institutions: the Tax Foundation for US state property tax rates, the Census Bureau ACS for HOA data, MGIC for PMI rate benchmarks, the HM Land Registry for UK house price trends, and HMRC for stamp duty rates. We review and update the data regularly to make sure the calculator reflects current market conditions.

We built this tool because we wanted it to exist — and because we believe that better financial information leads to better decisions. We're not mortgage brokers, estate agents, or financial advisers. We're just people who care about getting this decision right, and who wanted to share the tool that helped us think it through clearly.

If you have feedback, spotted an error, or want to suggest a feature, we'd genuinely love to hear from you. You can reach us at rentvbuycalc@gmail.com.