Rent Affordability Calculator

It's a long-standing rule of thumb — not a law — for keeping housing costs manageable relative to income. It originated from US federal housing assistance guidelines and became the informal standard many landlords and renters use today.

If you have other monthly debts (a car payment, student loans, credit cards), this calculator also checks that rent plus those debts stays under 40% of your gross income — whichever limit is stricter wins, the same logic lenders use for mortgages.

Many landlords and rental applications ask for annual income of roughly 40x the monthly rent — that's just the 30% rule expressed the other way around, and this calculator shows both.

No — it's a starting point, not a hard limit. In expensive cities many renters spend well above 30%, and if you have low debt and high savings, spending more on rent may be reasonable for you. Adjust the slider to see how the max changes.