Lot Yield Calculator

Gross Lots is the theoretical count you'd get by dividing the entire raw parcel by your Average Lot Size with no deductions at all, while Net Buildable Lots subtracts unusable land, roads and infrastructure, and required open space first, then divides only the remaining buildable area. The gap between the two, shown as Lots Lost to Deductions, illustrates how much of a parcel's raw theoretical density typically never becomes a home site once real site constraints and zoning requirements are applied.

Roads & Infrastructure percentage varies by subdivision layout and local standards, but this calculator's default of 20% reflects a common midpoint for suburban residential subdivisions — denser grid layouts with more internal streets can lose a higher share, while larger-lot rural subdivisions with fewer roads per acre can lose less. Check your local planning department's typical approved subdivision plats or your civil engineer's site plan for a figure specific to your parcel's actual layout.

Net Buildable Lots is Net Buildable Area divided by Average Lot Size, so for a fixed buildable area, a larger average lot size necessarily produces fewer total lots — this is the fundamental density tradeoff in subdivision design between fewer, larger, typically higher-priced lots and more, smaller, typically higher-volume lots. Which direction makes more financial sense depends on your target buyer, local zoning-minimum lot sizes, and how per-lot sale prices scale with lot size in your specific market.

No — this calculator applies flat percentage deductions to Total Acreage regardless of the parcel's actual shape, slopes, wetlands boundaries, or how efficiently a specific lot layout can be platted onto that geometry, all of which a real civil engineer's site plan has to account for. An irregularly shaped or heavily sloped parcel can yield meaningfully fewer buildable lots than this percentage-based estimate suggests, so treat the output as an early feasibility screen rather than a substitute for an actual preliminary plat.

Each of the three deduction percentages is capped independently at its own maximum, but nothing stops their sum from exceeding 100% — for example, a parcel with heavy wetlands, a dense internal road network, and a large mandated open-space set-aside together. When that happens, Net Buildable Area, Net Buildable Lots, Density, and Land Efficiency all floor at zero rather than going negative, since a parcel cannot have less than none of itself available to build on. A result of zero buildable lots in that situation is a signal to revisit your deduction assumptions, not a literal claim that the site is worthless — double-check each percentage against your actual site constraints.