What you actually walk away with

The number a seller cares about is not the sale price. It is the number at the bottom of the settlement statement, after the payoff, the commission, the excise and the dozen smaller things nobody mentions until they appear. Most sellers do not see that figure until a day or two before closing, which is far too late for it to inform any decision.

The worksheet below builds it. It starts empty on purpose.

Why there are no default numbers in it

Every net proceeds calculator on every real estate site ships with confident defaults: a commission rate, a typical attorney fee, an average closing cost. The seller enters a price, sees a total, and reads it as a figure rather than as the output of somebody else's assumptions. The assumptions are usually invisible and almost always someone else's.

So the only number pre-filled here is the Massachusetts deeds excise, because that one is set by statute rather than by custom, and even that is shown as an editable rate with its basis written next to it. Everything else is a number a specific person can tell you, and the note under each field says which person.

A blank line is an honest answer. A plausible-looking default is not.

The lines that surprise people

Your payoff is not your balance. Ask your lender for a written payoff figure good through your expected closing date. It includes interest to that date and may include a discharge fee, and it is the only figure the closing attorney can work from.

Commission is two separate decisions now. What you pay your own broker is a term of your listing agreement, negotiated before the house goes on the market. Since August 2024 the buyer's side is negotiated separately, and whether you contribute to it is a term of the offer you accept — not a standing rate, and not something to assume before an offer exists. Both fields start at zero here for that reason. There is more on how this changed on the page about selling with Tim.

The excise rounds up. Massachusetts charges its deeds excise per $500 of consideration or fraction thereof, which means a sale at $500,001 is charged on the next full increment rather than on the extra dollar. Most online calculators multiply instead, and are wrong by a few dollars in a way that is invisible until someone reconciles against a settlement statement.

If the property is on septic, add a Title 5 inspection — and understand that the inspection fee is the small number. A failure is a separate project with its own timeline, and it is the single most common reason a closing date moves. What a Title 5 inspection covers and what it does not goes through that properly.

Adjustments run both ways. Taxes, water and any remaining heating fuel are prorated at closing. If you have prepaid past the closing date you are owed money back, so that line can be negative.

What this worksheet is not

It is arithmetic on the numbers you enter. It is not an estimate of your proceeds, because it knows nothing about your title, what an inspection will turn up, or how the adjustments land on the day. It does not calculate capital gains or model any tax consequence of the sale; whether you owe anything depends on facts this page has no access to, and that question belongs with a tax professional rather than an agent.

The figure that actually governs comes from your closing attorney, on a settlement statement, shortly before closing. Everything before that is planning.

Using it earlier than you think you need to

The useful time to fill this in is before you list, not after you have an offer. It is the difference between choosing a price and discovering one. If the net at your expected price does not do what you need it to do — clear the mortgage, fund the next purchase, settle an estate — that is worth knowing while you still have every option, including not selling yet.

Once you have a figure, a real valuation tells you whether the price at the top of it is plausible, and the preparation and pricing page covers what moves the number the sale price actually lands at. If the arithmetic says a conventional sale does not work on your timeline, the options for selling on a deadline lays out what does, with what each one costs.

If you would rather talk it through than fill it in, send Tim the address and what you are trying to achieve and he will build it with you.