A house flip case study: the real numbers on a $520k cosmetic flip

This is the first in a monthly house flip case study series, where I run a real-shaped Australian deal through the full numbers so you can see what actually survives to the bottom line. Nobody publishes worked flip figures in Australia, so the internet is full of "I made $150k flipping" posts that quietly skip stamp duty, holding and tax. This one skips nothing.

The deal below is an illustrative worked example — a composite of the sort of entry-level regional flip I look at constantly, priced with the FlipPro calculators and the same named cost sources I use on every post. It is not a specific customer's live analysis, and your own suburb will move every line. But the shape is real, and the shape is the lesson.

The deal behind this house flip case study

A three-bedroom, one-bathroom brick-veneer on a 600m² block in a regional NSW growth town. Around 110m² of internal floor. Deceased estate, structurally sound, and cosmetically stuck in about 1994 — original kitchen, one tired bathroom, carpet over floorboards, brown everything. Listed at $520,000 with a motivated executor and no other renovator sniffing around it.

That last detail is the whole deal. You do not make money on a flip by renovating well. You make it by buying below what the finished product is worth, and a motivated off-market vendor is where that gap lives. If you want that channel, here's how to find off-market property deals in Australia. The renovation just unlocks value that the buy price already created.

The obvious play is a cosmetic-plus flip: new kitchen, new bathroom, paint through, new flooring, tidy the yard, re-sell to an owner-occupier who wants to move in, not renovate. No walls moving, no extension, no DA. That keeps the timeline short and the risk low, which for a flip is worth more than a bigger but slower uplift.

The feasibility: scoring it across the strategies

Before I model one strategy, I score the address against all of them, because the "obvious" play is not always the best one. Here is how this block stacks up:

• Cosmetic-plus flip — strongest fit. Liveable house, dated finishes, owner-occupier resale market. This is the play.
• Full structural renovation — possible, but the extra spend on reconfiguration doesn't clear the ceiling the local comps set. More risk for the same top price.
• Subdivision or granny flat — the 600m² block and zoning could technically allow a secondary dwelling, but the numbers echo the Penrith subdivision I broke down, where the end-value comps simply didn't support the build cost. Not here.
• Buy and hold — fine long-term, but that is a different business to flipping, and a different tax outcome.

The point of scoring every strategy is to kill the expensive daydreams early. The block "could" be subdivided, but a two-minute feasibility says the cosmetic flip is the only version of this deal that pencils.

The numbers, line by line

Here is the entire cost stack. Every external figure is sourced; the deal parameters are illustrative.

The stamp duty comes straight off the Revenue NSW transfer duty schedule — $11,152 plus $4.50 for every $100 over $372,000, which puts a $520,000 buy at about $17,800 as an investor with no first-home concession. Check yours with the stamp duty calculator before you set a ceiling. Conveyancing runs $1,200–$3,500 and a combined building and pest report costs $400–$800.

The $70,000 reno is a cosmetic-plus scope on ~110m². Against the Archicentre Australia CostGuide (2026) band of roughly $1,600–$3,900 per square metre for an existing-home renovation, that is a deliberately restrained, wet-areas-focused budget with a contingency held back — most of it lands in the kitchen and the bathroom, where the money and the value both concentrate. Price your own scope with the renovation cost calculator instead of trusting a number in your head.

Holding costs of about $16,000 cover loan interest on both drawdowns, rates, water, insurance and utilities across a five-month hold — model yours with the holding cost calculator. Selling costs assume an agent commission around 2.5% on the resale plus marketing and styling.

Now the resale. A well-executed cosmetic-plus flip in this market re-sells to an owner-occupier at about $700,000. That gives:

• Pre-tax profit: $700,000 − $649,200 = ~$50,800
• Tax: a genuine flip is taxed as ordinary income, not a capital gain — at a 37% marginal rate, roughly $18,800
• After-tax profit: ~$32,000

What the deal score said (and why it's not a 90)

Scored the way FlipPro scores every listing, this deal lands as an illustrative 64 out of 100 — a "worth a look", not a "strong buy". Sixty-four is an honest number, and it is worth understanding why it isn't higher.

The buy discipline is good: the off-market price is genuinely below the finished value, which is the single biggest driver of the score. What drags it down is margin thinness and timeline risk. A $32,000 after-tax result on a deal turning over $650,000 is a real profit, but the buffer is slim. Blow the reno budget by $15,000, let the hold drift two extra months, or sell into a soft month and that $32,000 halves. The score reflects a deal that works, but only if you run it tightly. It is exactly the deal that separates flippers who model before they buy from the ones who find out after.

The verdict: a go, but the margin is in the buy

This is a buy — at $520,000. It is not a buy at $560,000. Push the purchase price up $40,000 and the pre-tax profit falls from about $50,800 to roughly $11,000, because you pay more duty, carry more interest, and hand the same slice to the agent and the ATO on the way out. The deal lives or dies at the front, not the finish.

That is the discipline the 70% rule tries to enforce, and it is why is house flipping profitable in Australia is really a question about your buy price. If you want the full cost stack explained bucket by bucket, I have written up what it costs to flip a house in Australia separately.

Run this on your own address

The value of a case study is that you copy the method onto your deal, not the numbers. Find the below-value buy, score it across every strategy, price the reno honestly, and subtract the costs the listing never mentions before you make an offer.

That is the entire job FlipPro does in a couple of minutes on a real listing: paste the URL, get the deal score, the strategy scoring, the priced reno and the maximum you should pay. See a full worked sample analysis, read how the Full Analysis is built, or check the pricing and run your next deal before you commit to it. The best flip is the one you talk yourself out of at the offer stage — and the numbers are how you do it.

This is general information only and not financial, tax, legal or town-planning advice. The deal above is an illustrative worked example, not a specific live listing or a specific customer's analysis. Stamp duty, renovation, holding and selling costs change and vary by state, site and timeline, and tax treatment depends on your circumstances. Figures are indicative ranges from sources current at the time of writing. Do your own due diligence and get professional advice before you commit.

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