How to work out rental yield
- Gross yield: rent per £100 of price, a year
- £5.75
- Rent after voids
- £13,269.23
- Agent fees
- £1,326.92
Every figure on this page is computed from the inputs you enter, by the method stated below it. The only constants are the Income Tax rates and bands and the basic-rate restriction on finance-cost relief, taken from GOV.UK and dated on the page. RentRollDesk publishes no market yields and quotes no survey: the defaults are a worked example to replace with your own.
Rental yield is the annual rent as a share of what the property cost or is worth, and it is the first number a landlord works out and the last one they should trust on its own. Gross yield ignores every cost; net yield takes off the voids, the agent and the running costs; and what actually reaches your account also takes off the mortgage interest. This guide walks the three figures in order, and the free rental yield calculator on this site works them from your own numbers with no account.
Try the free yield calculator Free to use. No account, no card, no trial clock.
Gross yield: annual rent divided by price
Twelve months of rent divided by the purchase price or the current value, as a share of a hundred. The tool shows it as rent per £100 of price a year, which is the same figure read as money. It is the number listings and agents quote, and it is useful for comparing one property with another and for nothing else, because it assumes the property is let every week and costs nothing to run.
Net yield: take off voids, fees and running costs first
Knock the void weeks off the year's rent, take the agent's fee off what is left, and take off insurance, service charge, ground rent, repairs and safety certificates, then divide by the price. That is the yield the property actually earns before the mortgage, and it is the figure to compare against what the money would earn elsewhere.
Then the mortgage, because the lender is paid before you are
Mortgage interest is not part of yield, which is a property's figure rather than a landlord's, but it is the largest cost most landlords carry, so the tool shows what is left after it as a cash figure. A property with a respectable net yield and a large interest bill can leave very little, and that is the number to look at before buying.
How to work out rental yield: common questions
How do you calculate rental yield?
Gross yield is annual rent divided by price, as a percentage: twelve months of rent, divided by what you paid or what it is worth, times a hundred. Net yield takes the voids, the agent's fee and the running costs off the rent first. The calculator on this site does both and shows them as rent per £100 of price a year, which reads the same as the percentage.
What is a good rental yield?
There is no published figure, and this site does not invent one: what is good depends on where the property is, what it cost to buy, what it costs to run and what the money would earn elsewhere. The honest comparison is the net yield of one property against another and against the alternatives, which is what the calculator gives you.
Should I use the purchase price or the current value?
The purchase price tells you what your money has earned since you bought; the current value tells you what it would earn if you sold and bought again today, which is the question when deciding whether to keep a property. The calculator takes either; enter the one that matches the decision you are making.
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Cite or embed this figure
On the worked example, £1,150 a month on a £240,000 property is a gross yield of £5.75 per £100 of price a year; after two void weeks, a 10% agent fee and £1,400 of running costs the net yield is £4.39 per £100, and after £6,000 of mortgage interest £4,542.31 a year reaches the landlord.
Rental yield calculator (Gross yield: rent per £100 of price, a year): £5.75, RentRollDesk, worked example.
Cite as: "How to work out rental yield, RentRollDesk", updated 2026-09-03, https://rentrolldesk.com/how-to-work-out-rental-yield/.