How to use Bigger Pockets calculator for first House Hack?

[Michael Cox]

Hello everyone,

I'm new to real estate investing, and am looking to purchase/house hack a duplex when my lease is up in February of 2021. I plan to use a FHA loan, then repeat the process the next year with my girlfriend. I've been consuming content like crazy (BP books, BP podcasts, YouTube university, etc...) to learn as much as possible and am excited to go through the process to get some hands on experience.

I've been practicing analyzing deals using the BP calculators, but recently I've hit a small road block. I've been struggling on conceptilizing how I should calculate rental income and CoC return for my first year. I've been running the deals through the calculator as-if I wasn't planning to house hack, and was simply collecting the full rent for both units (with the idea, this would be the CoC return after I moved out). Then recently I thought, should I instead use the rent amount for the unit I don't live in, and the amount I say from the rent I pay today versus the amount I have to contribution to the mortgage as the rental income.

For example, let's show there is a duplex where both sides rent for $750. And for this story, the rent I pay today is $1,000. Should I calculate rental income as $1,500 ($750 * 2) or as $1,000 ($750 + ($1,000 - $750))? The CoC return number is obviously drastically different.

Any insight would be extremely helpful!