Cap rates can help you determine whether an investment will be "better" and/or more risky. A lower cap rates is usually associated with safer investments or less risky investments, while higher caps are associated with more risks.
Cap rate, also called capitalization, is one of most widely used return metrics when evaluating the performance a prospective or current real estate investment.
The "caprate" in real-estate investing is the unlevered, or nominal rate of return on an investment based solely on its annual net Operating Income (NOI).
You can calculate the value for a building by using the same cap rates formula. For example, let's say that you know the property is generating $500,000 per year and that the market cap rate for a similar project would be 5%. Then you divide $500,000 by $5 million to get a $10,000,000 valuation. The same project may be worth just $8.3million, if the appropriate market cap is 6%. This illustrates how shifting market expectations (in our case, the caprate), can cause implied estate values to fluctuate.
The formula for calculating a caprate is simple: it is the annual NOI divided times the property's market value. A property worth $10million and producing $500,000 in NOI will have a cap rate at 5%.
Cap rates are frequently compared to a bond coupon because both can be used for payment as a percentage on the asset's worth.
Cap rates, which are expressed in percentages and represent returns at a single time point, can be used to evaluate a property investment or compare properties. The assessment is not complicated by considering the impact of debt on the project.