How Much Do Rental Properties Make? Real Numbers From Investors
October 23, 2026
AI Summary
5 min read"$442 a month for a duplex I put 10% down on, I feel really good about." That is the actual cash flow Grace Gutenkoff earned from one of her rental properties last year — not the "phantom cash flow" that her underwriting predicted, but the real number after a tenant left a unit "absolutely disgustingly." On this episode of the BiggerPockets podcast, host Henry Washington sits down with Grace Gutenkoff and Amelia McGee, co-founders of the Wire community and co-authors of The Self-Managing Landlord, to walk through the raw financials of four of their actual rental properties. The numbers are not glamorous. They are instructive.
The Gap Between Phantom Cash Flow and Real Cash Flow
Every investor runs the numbers before buying. But the number on the spreadsheet — what Grace calls "phantom cash flow" — is almost always higher than what actually lands in your bank account. Grace's duplex illustrates the gap perfectly. On paper, the property should generate about $770 per month in cash flow. In reality, over the last 12 months, it produced $442 per month. The difference came from a single event: a tenant turnover that cost $4,100 in repairs. That one expense ate months of projected profit.
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What you'll learn
- 1 Timestamped Outline
- 2 (00:03) **Episode Introduction** - Henry Washington introduces the premise: real numbers from actual rental properties, not inflated social media numbers
- 3 (02:54) **Grace's First Deal: Duplex with 10% Down** - A side-by-side duplex purchased in 2021 for $135K with only 10% down through negotiation with a local bank
- 4 (07:55) **The Math on Full-Time Income** - Henry and guests calculate how many properties like this you'd need to replace a job
- 5 (11:24) **Ad Break** - Promotions for BiggerPockets scaling conference, Host Financial DSCR loans, Rent to Retirement STR loophole program, NRAG insurance, and Indeed
- 6 (15:55) **Amelia's First Deal: Triplex with Seller Financing** - A three-unit property in a town of 5,000 people bought for ~$50K with zero-interest seller financing
- 7 (20:28) **Amelia's Triplex Real Cash Flow** - After refinancing at 7% in 2023, the actual numbers over eight months
+ Full timestamped outline available in the app
Guests on this episode
Show Notes
How much do landlords make? Whether you want to own rentals or want to benchmark your property portfolio, this episode is for you. We’ve got four real rental properties with real rent, expenses, and cash flow numbers to share. And this isn’t that fluffed-up “cash flow” number many investors claim—this is the real (as in taxable) cash flow for actual deals owned by friends of the podcast, Amelia McGee and Grace Gudenkauf.
Amelia and Grace brought a variety of deals to share—from single-family homes to triplexes, some seller-financed, some with bank loans, some cash-flowing, and others…not so much. They’re sharing real purchase prices, rents, expenses, and cash flow numbers to show you the reality of investing in 2026.
We’ll talk about how Grace was able to land a 10% down (cash-flowing) duplex deal thanks to a local bank, the 0% interest seller financing loan Amelia picked up just by having a conversation, a “boring” stress-free rental that pays $250+/month in profit like clockwork, and why one of them sacrificed cash flow for a $42,000 (tax-free) payout!
These are real deals in affordable markets that investors still have access to—and we’re sharing exactly how much they make.
In This Episode We Cover
How much rental properties are making in 2026 (different properties, different financing)
The surprisingly obvious way to get a low down payment loan on your next rental
Scoring a 0% interest rate using the seller financing strategy
Why Amelia pays for her tenants’ utilities instead of billing them back
Buy more rentals or pay off your portfolio and why you don’t need to scale big to secure financial freedom
Is negative cash flow worth it?
More from this podcast
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