Entries by Spencer Burton
Watch Me Build – Capital Stack with Mezzanine Debt
One of the more difficult aspects of modeling a real estate development is figuring out how to handle equity and debt cash flows. This becomes all the more difficult when a second tranche of debt is introduced. In this Watch Me Build video, I turn on my screen recorder and talk through modeling a capital […]
Real Estate Financial Modeling Using Google Sheets
Virtually every real estate firm in the world uses Microsoft Excel to analyze real estate. It’s the industry standard and if you work in real estate you better know how to model real estate in Excel. So regardless of whether you love Excel or hate it, the hard truth is that this fact isn’t going […]
Permanently Remove “Update Links” Alert in Real Estate Excel Models
There are few Excel experiences more frustrating than getting that “this workbook contains links to one or more external sources” alert and not being able to find/break the external links causing it. In this tutorial, I teach you five steps to fix the problem. In the video that follows the written instructions, I fix the […]
Watch Me Build a Tenant Rollover Analysis Model
The feedback has been positive on the ‘Watch Me Build a Multifamily Model’ video I recorded earlier this year. So I thought I’d follow that up with another. This time I build a Real Estate Tenant Rollover Analysis Model and talk through the methodology, keyboard shortcuts, and formulas I use as I build the model. […]
All-in-One (Ai1) Walkthrough #2 – Office, Retail, Industrial Rent Roll Tab
This walkthrough, our second in the series, will detail how to use the office/retail/industrial rent roll (see ORI-RR Tab). The rent roll tab is arguably the most important, and most complex, tab in the All-in-One model. Below we post a video of the walkthrough together with a brief description of the key components of this tab. Video […]
Watch Me Build a Multifamily Real Estate Model (Updated Feb 2020)
One way to become a better real estate financial modeling professional, is to watch other professionals model. I know in my career being able to physically see how others tackle different modeling problems has shaped my methods and made me better at what I do. I remember sitting with a friend, watching him zip back […]
Create Dynamic Sub-Property Type Drop-Down Menus in Excel
A few years ago, I created a tutorial on building smart drop-down menus in Excel using dynamic named ranges and data validation lists. This offered a great way to have drop-down menus in your model that could be easily changed by the user to fit their specific needs. But what about when you want a […]
Using VBA to Hide Rows in Excel
Over the next few minutes, I will show you two techniques for automatically hiding and showing rows in Excel using VBA code. These techniques I use regularly in my real estate financial models to make for a more intuitive user experience. In the past, I’ve created similar tutorials for hiding worksheets or creating dynamic buttons […]
Modeling a Mortgage Loan Assumption Using the All-in-One
I recently had a discussion in the All-in-One support forum about how to model a mortgage loan assumption using my All-in-One Model for Underwriting Acquisitions and Development. Prior to version 0.77, this required manually overriding various calculation cells (i.e. black font cells). So I updated the model to make handling assumable debt more intuitive. In […]
How to Create Dynamic, In-Cell Buttons and Toggles in Microsoft Excel
Creating intuitive, user-friendly, visually appealing models is one aspect of mastering real estate financial modeling. One way to make your models easy for people to use and more attractive in general is to use dynamic, theme-appropriate, in-cell buttons (ie. a button that changes text, font, background based on certain logic) and toggles (i.e. buttons to […]
Watch Me Expand the Home Construction Pro Forma
I’m regularly asked to expand my single family home construction pro forma to analyze the construction of more than one home. I’ve contemplated adding that functionality to the model, but it is such a custom task that no template could really cover even a majority of multi-home scenarios. So instead, I thought I’d show you […]
All-in-One (Ai1) Walkthrough #1 – Permanent Debt Tab (Updated Nov 2019)
In an effort to provide greater instruction on how to use our All-in-One Underwriting Tool for Real Estate Development and Acquisition, we’ve developed a series of walkthrough videos and posts on the methodology behind the various components of the model. This walkthrough, our first in the series, will detail how the Permanent Debt Module is […]
Using Conditional Formatting in Real Estate Financial Modeling
Your real estate financial models are only as good as their ability to be used by others. Or in other words, if others can’t figure out how to use your model, it isn’t worth much! So when building real estate financial model templates, besides using Modeling Best Practices, I personally employ a variety of techniques […]
Preferred Return – Simple Interest vs. Compound Interest
A concept common to real estate partnership structures, preferred return refers to the preference given to a certain class of equity partners when distributing available cash flow. The preferred return is generally calculated as either a percentage return on contributed capital or a given multiple on contributed capital, and must first be paid before common […]