Home Buying Costs Calculator

The cash a home purchase demands at completion is larger than the deposit alone. Transfer tax, legal fees, a survey, mortgage arrangement charges and moving costs all fall due around the same date, and each is a separate line item. This calculator adds them to the deposit and reports the total, alongside the mortgage the purchase still requires.

Which inputs matter most

The model is a plain sum, so under an absolute change every line carries the same marginal weight of 1: add 100 to transfer tax, legal fees, the survey, mortgage arrangement fees or moving costs and the completion total moves by exactly 100. Adding 100 to the deposit moves it by 100 as well, but the deposit differs in kind. That 100 also comes off Mortgage Required, so it shifts money between two rows on the same panel, whereas 100 on a fee line is cash that leaves and buys nothing. Under a proportional change the lines separate by size: the What-If cards shift each input by 10%, so the largest line produces the largest move, and the smallest can fall outside the six cards shown. Which line leads depends on the figures entered. On the sample figures used on this page it is the deposit, and the survey is the line that drops out. Property Price is the exception under either basis. It does not enter the completion total at all, and instead sets Mortgage Required, which is the price minus the deposit, and the denominator behind both percentage rows.

What's happening under the hood

Straight sum of all cash outlays falling due at purchase. The mortgage figure is the price minus the deposit, before any fees a lender might allow to be added to the loan.

Why this matters

The deposit is only part of the cash a purchase demands. Transfer tax, legal and survey fees, lender charges and moving costs together can add several percent of the price on top, and they all fall due around completion. Totalling them at the offer stage is what makes any gap visible in advance rather than at the closing date.

What this doesn't capture

This total is the cash needed at completion under the figures entered. It does not include ongoing costs such as property tax, insurance, utilities, maintenance, or any service charge the property carries, all of which begin after the purchase. It also assumes the fees are paid from cash rather than added to the mortgage, and that the amounts entered match the final quotes; actual fees vary by provider and jurisdiction.

Worked Example

On a 300,000 purchase with a 60,000 deposit, suppose transfer tax is 5,000, legal fees 1,500, a survey 500, mortgage arrangement 1,000, and moving 1,000. The cash needed at completion is 60,000 + 9,000 = 69,000, the deposit plus 9,000 of other upfront costs, which is 3.00% of the price. The mortgage required is the price minus the deposit: 240,000. Trimming any single fee line moves the completion figure down by the amount trimmed. Adding to the deposit moves it up by the amount added, and takes the same amount off the mortgage required.

Educational Framing

The calculation is illustrative. Fee structures and transfer tax bands differ between providers and jurisdictions, and quoted amounts shift over time. The output is built for comparing scenarios: a larger deposit against a smaller one, or one set of fee quotes against another. It does not stand as a quote itself.