Ratio The DSCR Desk
Colophon · No. 04

What this is.
And what it isn't.

Ratio is a free, live calculator for rental-property DSCR refinances. No account. No lead capture. No data leaves your browser. Here's exactly how it works, and exactly what the numbers mean.

Ratio is a small, deliberately narrow tool. It models a single product — the DSCR cash-out refinance on investor residential property — and it tries to model that product honestly, using the same four or five numbers every lender's underwriter will be looking at when they read your file.

Methodology

The underwriting readout is computed with the same formulas every residential lender uses on this product. No proprietary adjustment, no "Ratio score," nothing invented:

P&I = P × (r × (1+r)^n) / ((1+r)^n − 1) where P = principal, r = annual rate / 12, n = years × 12.

This is the standard fixed-rate amortization formula — the same one Excel's PMT() function computes. Reference: Wikipedia: Mortgage calculator.

PITIA = P&I + property taxes + insurance + HOA (when applicable)

HOA is included in PITIA only when the property actually has it (condos, townhomes, PUDs). References: Newcastle Loans on PITI; DSLD Mortgage on PITIA.

DSCR = monthly rental revenue / PITIA

Residential DSCR lenders measure rent against PITIA — not against operating cash flow. Operating expenses (management, utilities, STR fees) are tracked in the cash-flow display but deliberately excluded from the DSCR denominator, because lenders exclude them. References: Kiavi: "divide the monthly rent by the PITIA"; Lendmire: DSCR rental-income methodology.

LTV = loan amount / property value
Cash out = loan amount − existing payoff − estimated closing (≈ 2.5% × loan)

The 2.5% closing-cost assumption is a low-end planning estimate. Actual DSCR cash-out refi closing costs typically run 2–5% of the loan amount, with 3–4% most common — fixed fees (appraisal, title, recording, escrow) amortize favorably on larger loans and more punitively on smaller ones. References: Trulo Mortgage on DSCR refi closing costs; OfferMarket's fee breakdown. For loans under ~$200K, consider mentally adding 50–100 bps to our estimate.

Interest-only payments are computed as principal × r. A stress-tested DSCR at 25% revenue haircut is also computed internally — that's the conservative end of industry norm; most DSCR lenders apply a 10–20% haircut to STR projections (Host Financial; Rabbu's STR underwriting guide).

Lender evaluation

Each of the ten lender programs is a record of the guideline floors that program publishes (or, where not publicly disclosed, an industry-norm inference — flagged as such on screen with a dagger). For your deal, each program runs through the same four-step check:

  1. Does the program lend on your rental strategy and property type? If no, the program is structurally out.
  2. Does your DSCR clear the program's floor? If within 0.10 of the floor, it's flagged Marginal.
  3. Does your LTV clear the program's cap? If over by any measurable margin, it fails.
  4. Does your FICO clear the floor, and is the loan within the program's size range? Near-floor FICO is flagged Marginal; under-floor or out-of-size fails.

Strategy-specific floors

Two lenders publish materially different floors for short-term rentals vs. long-term rentals, and Ratio applies the correct floor to your evaluation based on the strategy you select:

  • Lima One Capital — LTR cash-out at 75% LTV / 1.00 DSCR / 660 FICO; STR stricter at 70% LTV / 1.30 DSCR / 700 FICO.
  • Visio Lending — LTR floor at 1.00 DSCR; STR cash-out guide recommends 1.20+ DSCR.

Strategy-specific floors are marked with a * in the matrix. When you toggle the rental strategy, the matrix re-evaluates against the correct floor.

Unpublished floors

Not every lender publicly discloses every floor. When a lender's website doesn't print a specific minimum, we use an industry-norm inference and mark it with a †. Kiavi, MoFin (DSCR minimum), and CoreVest (FICO minimum) currently fall in this bucket. Treat those cells as estimates and confirm directly with the lender.

Data sources

Lender guidelines are pulled from each lender's official program page. All verified 2026-04-24; re-verify quarterly.

Published minimums change. When they do, the file on this site is app.js, the lender array sits in the first ~200 lines, and the VERIFIED_ON constant advances. Contribute or flag corrections directly.

Privacy

Ratio collects nothing.

The underwriter runs entirely in your browser. The inputs you type never leave the page. There is no account, no sign-up, no "enter your email for results," no "match me with a lender." The only network traffic this site generates is:

  • The HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and font files required to render the page, served from Cloudflare Pages and Fontshare.
  • Anonymous Cloudflare access logs — the same network-level record every website on the internet generates, retained per Cloudflare's standard policy.

There are no third-party trackers, no pixel tags, no Google Analytics, no Meta pixel, no session recording, no LinkedIn insights tag, no Hotjar. If you disable JavaScript, you see a static page; if you enable it, the math runs on your device. When you close the tab, the deal closes with it — unless you copied the share link, in which case the inputs are encoded into the URL hash and nowhere else.

Disclaimer

Ratio is a calculator. It is not:

  • A mortgage lender, mortgage broker, or loan originator.
  • A licensed financial, legal, or tax advisor.
  • A pre-approval, rate lock, or any form of commitment from any institution.
  • A substitute for a full underwriting review by a licensed lender.

The lender qualification matrix reflects published guideline floors, not final approval criteria. Every real mortgage file is subject to appraisal, title, reserves verification, credit review, debt-to-income checks (where applicable), property-condition review, flood and insurance verification, HOA eligibility, and underwriter discretion. A deal that Qualifies on the board can still be declined for any of those reasons. A deal that Fails on the board can sometimes still get written through an exception request.

All inputs are user-supplied, all outputs are estimates, and all editorial content represents the author's reading of publicly available guidelines at the time of the 2026 edition. Guidelines change. Rates change. Programs come and go. When in doubt, call a licensed lender.

Updates

This edition (No. 01, 2026) is the first public release. The lender grid is maintained against published guidelines. When a lender program changes materially — new LTV ceiling, new DSCR floor, new property-type eligibility — the record on this site is updated in app.js and the version line in the footer advances.

Colophon

Typeset in Gambarino (display) and Supreme (body) by Indian Type Foundry, with JetBrains Mono for all numerals. Delivered from Cloudflare Pages as static HTML, CSS, and one JavaScript file — no framework, no bundler, no build step, no tracker. The whole site weighs less than a small photograph.

Built for investors, by investors. If you find an error in a lender's published guidelines, or a program this page should index and doesn't, that's worth flagging.