Users answer five questions:
How much do you pay in rent?
How old are you?
How much do you plan to invest?
What is the price of the home you’re considering?
When do you plan to retire?
The tool then runs two paths side by side. One buys now and invests later, as a fixed mortgage payment holds steady while rent keeps climbing. The other keeps renting and puts the same money into the market, including the down payment, closing costs and the monthly gap between rent and a mortgage payment.
Here’s an example: A 35-year-old is paying $2,000 a month in rent and looking at a $400,000 home, close to the national average. Buying puts the monthly payment at about $3,196. By age 65, the buy path reaches roughly $1.23 million in net worth, compared with about $940,000 for the renter who invested the difference. Carried out to age 82, the buyer leaves about $1.9 million to heirs and the renter about $840,000. Move the home price to $600,000 and the answer can change, which is the point.
“Everybody has an opinion on whether you should buy or keep renting, and most of that advice was built for somebody else,” said Jason Madiedo, CEO of SimplyPMG. “What matters is what the numbers say for you, everyone's situation might be different. We built something free and simple so people can see that for themselves.”
For users who want to go further, the tool charts 30 years of mortgage payments against rent plus renters insurance and shows the year the two paths cross, around year 15 in the example above. It tracks net worth by age through retirement, including how long savings last and what’s left for the family. A detailed math section lays out year-by-year schedules and a retirement drawdown that models a reverse mortgage alongside portfolio withdrawals. Interest rates, growth assumptions and every other input can be adjusted or reset to defaults.
SimplyPMG said the tool is intended to evolve as the market evolves so that potential homebuyers can make decisions based on current conditions instead of outdated assumptions. As rates, home prices and loan program guidelines shift, the tool's calculations and features will reflect those changes, giving buyers a realistic picture of what they can afford and which financing options fit their situation at any given moment.
“Some people will run this and find that renting makes sense, others will see buying makes sense, whatever the outcome is, it’s about helping them make a decision” said Madiedo. “We want to help people make this decision with real numbers in front of them, without the need to provide their information or complete a form”
The launch follows SimplyPMG’s rebrand earlier this year and reflects the company’s promise to make the path to homeownership simpler for first-time buyers.
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