After-repair value (ARV) is the estimated sale price of a property once it's fully renovated. Every other flip number — your max offer, your loan, your profit — depends on it. Get ARV wrong on the high side and the whole deal is built on sand.
Comparable sales are the foundation
ARV is not what a site 'estimates' or what the seller hopes. It's what similar, fully-renovated homes have actually sold for. Pull sold comps — not active listings — that match on square footage, bed/bath count, condition, and neighborhood, ideally closed within the last 3–6 months and within about a half-mile.
Adjust comps to your subject
No two homes are identical. Adjust each comp up or down for differences: extra bathroom, larger lot, finished basement, garage, or a superior finish level. The goal is an apples-to-apples price for your specific property after renovation. Then take the median of the adjusted comps rather than the average, which one outlier can distort.
Stay conservative
Because ARV multiplies through the entire deal, a small optimism becomes a large loss. Discount your adjusted median slightly, and never anchor to the single highest sale. If the deal only works at the top comp, it doesn't work.
Feed it into your offer
Once you have a conservative ARV, the Flip MAO Calculator turns it into a max allowable offer after repairs, holding, and selling costs.
Open the free Flip MAO Calculator →
Frequently asked questions
What's the difference between ARV and current value?
Current value is what the property is worth as-is today; ARV is what it will be worth after the planned renovation. Flip math runs on ARV, then subtracts repairs and costs.
Can I use Zillow for ARV?
Automated estimates are a rough starting point at best. A reliable ARV comes from recent sold, adjusted comparables of renovated homes — not an algorithm's guess on an unrenovated property.
How many comps do I need?
At least three to five recent, closed, well-matched sales. Adjust each to your subject property and use the median to avoid being skewed by an outlier.