Manual

Immotory is a platform for the calculation of real estate. The platform is aimed at private and commercial investors who want to find out quickly and without much research whether the purchase of a property is worthwhile for them. In principle, it is sufficient to provide the basic information from the expose to get a rough estimate. Information such as the land transfer tax and the vacancy rate are automatically determined based on the address given. The more information you have about the time, the more accurate the calculation will be. We think that it is important to reach at least the per mille limit. This rule was established by Alexander Raue from the Landlord's Diary and states that the monthly cash flow after deduction of all costs must be at least 1/1000 (one thousandth) of the purchase price. Otherwise the property will not pay off in the long run.

When you have made a calculation, you can save it in your portfolio and access it again at any time. In the further process you can enrich it with pictures of the property, documents and other information. All this information and files can then be shared with your banker or notary using the share function. Anyone you give the link to can then view your calculation and download the files. So there are no more problems with large ZIP files that need to be shared with the bank by mail because the bank's policies prohibit access to Google Drive and Co. Just write us via the feedback form.

Settings

In your settings you can configure Immotory to suit your personal requirements. You have the possibility to define categories in which you can place your property. In addition, you can customize the detail view of a calculation and you have the possibility to set default values for the calculation of new properties.

The following elements can be found in the settings:

You have the possibility to view your saved calculations in your portfolio in three different ways: In the form of maps, as a table or on a Google Maps map. With this dropdown you have the possibility to make a default setting.

 
When you use Immotory for the first time, a tour will be suggested to you when you make the first calculation. The tour will help you to get to know the individual elements directly in the calculation. After you have finished or deactivated it, it will no longer be displayed. If you want to activate it again, you can do so with this button.

Categories

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In this section you define the categories in which you can later place your calculations. Each category to which calculations have already been assigned is displayed in the main menu. If you click on it, only the calculations from the selected category will appear in the portfolio.

You can create as many categories as you like and determine their order by drag and drop. Deleting a category is only possible if no calculations have been assigned to it yet.

Cards

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The detail page of a calculation consists of several maps. Each map contains information on a specific topic. For example on financing or the balance sheet. In this section you can change the order of these cards and assign your own titles. This way you can customize the calculation view according to your personal preferences.

If you decide to reset the cards to the default, you will find a button at the top right of the card. If you press it, the original state will be restored.

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With this field you can set your personal tax rate. You can calculate it by taking the income tax x 100 on your last pay slip and dividing it by your salary. For example, if you paid 1,000 € wage tax and earn 5,000 € per month, your personal tax rate is 20 %. The calculation in the example is as follows:

(1,000 € x 100) / 5,000 € = 20 %.

It is important that you build up private reserves to be able to solve unforeseen problems with your properties. It can happen that the roof leaks and the costs are passed on to all owners. In this case, you simply access your reserves. As a rule of thumb, you can add about 0.50 - 1.00 € per square meter per year. For 50 cents, enter 6.00 € in this field (0.50 € x 12 months).

If you want to invest a fixed amount of equity, you can deposit it here. Usually it is common to have the property financed 100% by a bank and only pay the additional costs of the purchase, such as broker, notary and land register entry yourself. If you leave the field empty or enter 0.00 €, the additional purchase costs are automatically entered as equity in the calculation.

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The Income Tax Act stipulates that the acquisition and production costs of a property can be claimed in arrears. Therefore you have the possibility to deduct a part of the purchase price of your property from the tax each year. This tax benefit is called "depreciation". This stands for "depreciation for acquisitions". The depreciation factor is usually 2 %. In a calculation, the depreciation is automatically offset against your cash flow.

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Every bank wants to earn interest on a loan it grants. In this field you can set a default interest rate, which will then be used in your calculations. You can manually override this value in each calculation.

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Here you can set a default repayment rate for the financing of your properties. It will then be automatically calculated in your calculations. You can manually override this value in each calculation.

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In this field you can set a default broker commission. Since it differs from property to property, this is only a rough guideline if you don't find any information in an expose. In principle, however, you should always enter the valid brokerage commission in your calculations.

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Here you can make an assumption about how much the notary fees for the purchase of your real estate will be. As a rule, one assumes 2 %. This value is automatically included in your calculations.

If you cannot view a property yourself because you live too far away or prefer to leave the valuation to a specialist, you can enter the expected costs for an appraiser or surveyor here.

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The land registry also wants to be paid for its services. Therefore you can enter the expected costs for the land register entry here. Usually you can expect 0.5 % of the purchase price.

If you decide to let a loan only run for a certain number of years in order to look for a follow-up financing with better conditions for the remaining amount, then you can set a fixed term here. If you leave the field empty, the term of the loan will be calculated automatically.

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It often happens that in a Exposé either no or only the entire house money is indicated. For investors, however, only the non-apportionable part is interesting. This is because it has to be deducted from the basic rent and reduces the cash flow. In this field, you specify how much of the collected cold rent has to be deducted as house money. The calculation is done automatically in your calculations. You can manually overwrite the house money at any time.

If you hire a rental management company to take care of your properties, you can enter a standard price for new calculations here.

Although the property tax cannot be standardized, it is sometimes helpful to be able to give a rough value. This field is intended for this purpose.

The floor reference value must be determined separately for each property. For this you can use portals like BORIS-D. However, to store a comparable value for a rough calculation in advance, this field can be used.

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You can find the ownership share in the land register extract or sometimes in the expose or the last business plan for your property. There you can find e.g. 100/1000, which means that by purchasing the property you own 10 % of the total property.

In this field you can set a default value for the ownership share. The closer the value is to 100 %, the more of the property will be added to your ownership.

My Portfolio

The portfolio view gives you an overview of your calculated properties. You can choose between a map, table and world map view via Google Maps. In addition, you can divide your calculations into categories, which you have previously specified in the settings. As soon as at least one calculations is in a category, it will be displayed around the main menu. If you click on it, you will only see the calculations in this category in the overview.

The following elements can be found in the portfolio view:

You always create a new calculation with this button or with the menu item "New calculation" in the main menu. Both ways will bring you to an overview that allows you to choose between different ways to create a calculation.

This button shows you the stored calculations in your portfolio in a matrix of cards. Each map represents a calculated property and shows the most important information, such as living space, purchase price and yield.

This button shows you the stored calculations in your portfolio in the form of a clear table. Each row stands for a calculated property and shows the most important information, such as the living space, the purchase price and the yield.

This button shows you the saved calculations in your portfolio of a Google Maps world map. The calculated properties are displayed as markers on the map. If you click on one of the markers, an info map opens with the most important information, such as the living space, the purchase price and the yield.

If several markers are very close to each other, they are summarized and displayed as colored dots. If you click on one of these points, the map automatically zooms to a smaller section that shows all contained markers.

If you want to delete a calculation, you can do so with this button. You will find it in every view at either the bottom of the map or on the far right in a table row. The deletion process is final for unsaved calculations, they cannot be restored. Saved items are moved to the Trash until you delete them permanently.

Please note that after the final deletion neither you nor we can restore your deleted calculations.

If you have accidentally deleted a saved calculation, you have the possibility to restore individual calculations in the recycle bin. You can find the recycle bin in the main menu on the left side.

Sometimes it happens that you want to make a copy of an already saved calculation. You can do this with this button. All information, documents and images will be copied into a new one. The name is prefixed with a prefix so that you can distinguish them. Don't forget to save the new calculation after you have adjusted it.

Please note that this button is only shown for saved calculations.

This button opens a calculation in the detail view. There you can make changes or combine the calculation with other parts. A PDF download is also possible there. In the detail view you can also see all other pictures of the property.

Unsaved Apartment

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If you find a card with a striped background in your portfolio, it is a calculation that has not been saved. This happens, for example, when you want to save a calculation even though you are not logged in. In this case your entries are still available after login and nothing is lost. You can open the calculation as usual and continue to edit or delete it when you don't need it anymore.

When you are done with your adjustments, you should save it in any case, because unsaved calculations are only available as long as you don't delete your browser data and don't view your portfolio from another computer or cell phone. In addition, depending on the type of calculation, only one can be kept available at a time. This means that if you forget to save again, the previous one will be overwritten.

You will find a similar display in the table view of your portfolio. There the whole row is displayed striped.

Calculation

A core element of Immotory is the calculation of interesting properties. You have several possibilities to create a calculation. Either you decide on an apartment or an apartment building and enter the values manually, or you let the values for the calculation be imported automatically from one of the meta search engines ThinkImmo or immoMetrica. In all cases you will find yourself on the calculation page, where you can adjust the data and get immediate feedback in the form of a graphical comparison and a detailed result. In addition, you have the possibility to share the calculation with other people or download it as a PDF file. You can also attach pictures and files. So you always know where to find all information and documents about a property.

The following elements can be found on the calculation page:

The save button is located on the calculation page on the far right in the upper bar. As soon as you make a change, it changes its appearance so that it is completely filled in. This is a reminder that you should save your calculation, otherwise the changes may be lost. Also, when you leave the page you will be reminded that you have unsaved changes.

Please note that adding files automatically triggers a saving of the calculation. This is necessary to ensure data consistency.

With this button you can download a calculation as a PDF file. The button only appears after you have saved the calculation. Before that a download is not possible.

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Maybe you know the situation that you want to share your calculation and the documents about a property with your banker, but it turns out to be not so easy. Many banks do not allow access to Google Drive, Microsoft Onedrive or other cloud services through their security policies. Therefore, there is often no other choice than to send the documents piece by piece by e-mail to the banker. This is not a particularly satisfactory situation. That's why Immotory allows you to share your calculations, including all images and files, with your banker or other interested parties simply by link sharing. All you need to do is click on this button when you have saved your calculations. You will then receive a link that allows anyone who has the link to access your calculation. The nice thing about it is that they can see all the changes you make to your calculation. Your banker can then simply download the documents they need and download the calculation as a PDF file when they need it.

If you want to delete a calculation, you can do so with this button. The deletion process is final for unsaved calculations, they cannot be restored. Saved calculations are moved to the recycle bin until you delete them permanently.

Please note that after the final deletion neither you nor we can restore your deleted calculations.

This button takes you to this manual. Here you can always check if a function is not clear to you.

If you see a field like this in the calculation, its value will be calculated automatically until you make your own entry. So if you have not entered a housekeeping fee, as in this example, it will be calculated with a certain factor from the cold rent. If you enter your own value, the display of the field changes and the grey background and the white gear wheel disappears. In order to have the value automatically calculated again, you only need to delete its content.

Additionally, you have the possibility to define a unit for this field. For example, if you want to enter the house money not yearly (€ p.a.) but monthly (€ p.m.), then first enter the value and then change the unit on the right side. In addition to a fixed Euro amount you can also enter a percentage (%). Depending on the options for a field, you will be offered different units.

Please note that the unit can only be changed after you have entered a value manually!

Investments

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There are several maps in the calculation that allow you to dynamically add new elements. For example, as you can see in the example, you can specify investments that you need to make in relation to the property in question. This could be, for example, renovation work or refurbishment. You can add and price all of these by clicking on the plus symbol in the upper right corner of the cards. The individual possibilities are described in more detail below. If you want to remove an entry, you can click on the X-symbol at the end of the line on the right side. The entry will immediately disappear from your calculation.

Balance sheet

The balance sheet shows you a comparison of income and expenses. On the income page you can see the basic rent and the sum of all rents you receive on the components of the property. On the expenses side, you can see the cost of the loan in the form of interest, the repayment and the costs of running the property. These consist of the house money and the rent management for apartments and the property management costs for apartment buildings.

Map

On the Google Maps map you can see at a glance where the property you are calculating is located. This is only possible if you have entered a valid address in the address field. This can be a city or if you have the exact address, then the street, the house number and the city. You don't have to pay attention to the formatting because the address is automatically analyzed in the background and converted into a uniform format for the map display.

You can recognize that an address is valid by the fact that in this case a red marker appears on the map, which shows you the exact location. By the way, you can also display your portfolio overview in the form of a Google Maps map. Just click on the button with the small marker in the upper right corner of the overview.

With this button you can enrich your calculation with photos and other files. The files are then displayed in the map with the basic information by small symbols. Pictures are automatically transferred to the gallery and displayed as sliders at the top of the map. If you click on one of the file icons, the file will open (in the case of images and PDF files) or it will be downloaded.

This button allows you to specify investments that you need to make in relation to the property in question. This can be for example renovation work or refurbishment. All this you can add and price. The investments are then automatically calculated and are shown, among other things, in the loan and on the result card.

Just as with investments, you can use this button to add new lines for components that belong to your property. These can be for example a fitted kitchen or a parking space. Each entry can be assigned a price and a rent. Both values are automatically included in the calculation.

Here you can enter a name for your calculation. This name will be displayed in the top bar and in the portfolio overview after saving. At the same time it will be the headline in the downloadable PDF file.

In this field you enter a valid address for the property. This can be a city or if you have the exact address, then the street, house number and city.

So that you know at a glance who you are in contact with regarding a property, you can enter your contact person and address here.

If you found the property via a website, you can add the link to the expose here. If you right click on the button, the page will open in a new tab. This way you can quickly get there if you want to look again. If you have automatically imported the data from one of the meta searches, the link will be inserted automatically.

You can enter special features of an property in this field. Just enter the desired text and press the enter key. Then the new text will be stored in the form of a tag. This way you can always see the most important properties at a glance. To delete an entry you can use the backspace key or simply click with the mouse on the red X that appears when you move the cursor over an entry.

This field allows you to define one or more categories. Once you save, your calculation will appear in the portfolio overview when you click on the respective category in the left menu. You can change the categories and their order in the settings.

In this field you enter the purchase price from the expose. If the purchase price includes components such as the fitted kitchen or a parking space, you can either subtract them and enter them separately, or leave the components with 0.00 €.

Here you enter the living space of the property. If it is an apartment building, this value is automatically calculated from the stored apartments.

This field is for the number of rooms in the property. You can usually find this information in the expose. If it is an apartment building, this value is automatically calculated from the stored apartments.

The year of construction can also be found in the expose. It is needed for various calculations and should always be given. If you don't have it at hand, a rough estimate is sufficient in the beginning.

Here you enter the current or possible cold rent for the property. If you have received the current rental agreement from the real estate agent, you can check this information there again. It often happens that the expose shows the warm rent or no value at all instead of the cold rent. If the property is not rented out, you can check the possible basic rent, e.g. in the price atlas from ImmobilienScout. If it is an apartment building, this value is automatically determined from the stored apartments.

In this field you can enter the brokerage fee. You have the possibility to indicate it in percentage or Euro, depending on how it was determined by the broker.

Here you can deposit the house money. It is important that you only enter the non-apportionable costs. Only those costs have to be deducted from the rent and reduce your cash flow. In this field, you can indicate how much of the collected rent has to be deducted as housekeeping money. The calculation is done automatically, but you can overwrite the house money manually at any time.

If you hire a rental agency to take care of your properties, you can enter their price here.

The floor reference value must be determined separately for each property. For this you can use portals like BORIS-D. You can also enter an estimated value for a rough calculation, but you should be as accurate as possible.

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You can find the ownership share in the land register extract or sometimes in the expose or the last business plan for your property. There you will find e.g. 100/1000, which means that by purchasing the property you own 10 % of the total property. Here you can enter the ownership share for the caculated property. The closer the value is to 100 %, the more of the property will be counted in your possession.

The size of the land is necessary for the calculation of the ownership structure. If you do not specify a property size, it will be calculated back from the living space on the basis of legal principles. However, the result is an estimate and not a reliable key figure.

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As long as you do not enter any information yourself, the vacancy rate is automatically calculated based on the address you enter. It represents the ratio between the unlet apartments in relation to the total number of apartments on a certain key date. For you as an investor, this number is important to be prepared for the fact that your property could also be unlet for a certain period of time. In this case a reserve is calculated in the calculation.

It is important that you build up private reserves to be able to solve unforeseen problems with your properties. It can happen that the roof leaks and the costs are passed on to all owners. In this case, you simply access your reserves. As a rule of thumb, you can add about 0.50 - 1.00 € per square meter per year. For 50 cents, enter 6.00 € in this field (0.50 € x 12 months).

%
The Income Tax Act stipulates that the acquisition and production costs of a property can be claimed in arrears. Therefore you have the possibility to deduct a part of the purchase price of your property from the tax each year. This tax benefit is called "depreciation". This stands for "depreciation for acquisitions". The depreciation factor is usually 2%. The depreciation is automatically offset against your cash flow.

Although the property tax cannot be standardized, it is sometimes helpful to be able to give a rough value. This field is intended for this purpose.

%
Every bank wants to earn interest on a loan it grants. In this field, you can set the interest rate set by your bank. If you don't have a value yet, you can assume that it is around 2 %.

%
Here you can enter a repayment rate for the financing of your property. If you don't have a value yet, you can assume that it is around 2 %.

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In this field you can enter the costs for the notary. Since you usually do not know them in advance, you can assume about 2 %.

If you cannot view a property yourself because you live too far away or prefer to leave the valuation to a specialist, you can enter the costs for an appraiser or surveyor here.

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The land registry also wants to be paid for its services. Therefore you can enter the expected costs for the land register entry here. Usually you can expect 0.5% of the purchase price.

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Here you can specify the real estate transfer tax for the location of your property. If you leave this field empty, it will be automatically determined based on the address you enter.

In this field the calculated additional purchase costs appear. You can overwrite the value manually at any time. In this case the equity should also be adjusted if you want 100 % financing.

If you want to invest a fixed amount of equity, you can enter it here. Usually it is common to have the property financed 100 % by a bank and only pay the additional costs of the purchase, such as broker, notary and land register entry yourself. If you leave the field empty, the additional purchase costs are automatically entered as equity in the calculation.

Here you will find the required loan amount. If you should pay all nominal costs with your own capital and make a 100 % financing, this value corresponds to the purchase price.

Based on your information about interest and repayment, the duration of a possible loan is calculated. You can also enter a value of your own if you would like to have the financing run for 10 years only, for example, in order to get more favorable conditions with a follow-up financing and a better loan value by then. In this case, the remaining debt to be financed after the end of the financing appears in the result card.

ThinkImmo

If you use the meta search engine ThinkImmo, you can import an ad into Immotory with just one click. All relevant information will be read out of the advertisement and created as a new calculation in Immotory. This saves you a lot of time and you don't have to transfer the information from one place to another.

All you need to import an ad is the URL to the detail page of the ad. You can get this either from ThinkImmo or from the address bar of your browser. Alternatively, you can use the copy function on ThinkImmo. To do this, simply click on the button marked "TEILEN" in the top right-hand corner of a search result and then click on the "KOPIEREN" button. The URL is already in your clipboard and can be entered into the appropriate input field in the assistant.

You can find the assistant for the import of an ad on the page "New calculation" or via the start page. After you have opened the wizard, you can copy the URL into the input field. If you have the permission of the author to use the title, you can check the checkbox below. Then the title will be imported. Otherwise you can click on the button "Import". You will be forwarded to the new calculation.

immoMetrica

If you use the meta search engine immoMetrica, you can import an ad into Immotory with just one click. All relevant information will be read out of the ad and created as a new calculation in Immotory. This saves you a lot of time and you don't have to transfer the information from one place to another.

All you need to import an ad is the URL to the detail page of the ad. You get this from the address bar of your browser when you call up the ad. All you need to do is click on the link marked "Offer" in the table with the search results. Afterwards the detail page of the ad will open and you can copy the URL from the address bar of your browser.

You can find the assistant for the import of an ad on the page "New calculation" or via the start page. After you have opened the wizard, you can copy the URL into the input field. If you have the permission of the author to use the title, you can check the checkbox below. Then the title will be imported. Otherwise you can click on the button "Import". You will be forwarded to the new calculation.