Rental income and expense worksheet
A free Excel worksheet that tracks rent invoiced versus rent collected, logs every expense against an IRS Schedule E category, and nets out cash flow per property. Built for residential landlords with a handful of doors.
.xlsx · opens in Excel, Google Sheets, Numbers or LibreOffice · free, no watermark
Last updated September 2026
What the worksheet tracks
Income and expenses are only half of it. The worksheet is built around four columns most free templates skip:
- Rent expected — what the lease says is due this month, entered once.
- Rent collected — what actually arrived, typed in as it lands.
- Variance — collected minus expected, calculated for you. A tenant who is $150 short in March shows up in March.
- Category — every expense tagged with the IRS Schedule E line it belongs to, chosen from a dropdown so nothing gets mistyped into a bucket your accountant cannot use.
How to fill it in
- List each property on the Properties tab with purchase price and the fixed monthly costs — mortgage principal and interest, property tax, insurance, HOA.
- Add one row per tenant on the Rent Tracker tab and enter the monthly rent due from the lease.
- Each month, type what actually arrived into that month's cell. Leave it blank until the money clears; a promised payment is not income.
- Log expenses on the Expenses tab as receipts come in — date, property, category, vendor, amount, note.
- Read the Annual Summary tab. It is entirely formula-driven; you never type into it.
Three mistakes that cost landlords money
Recording deposits instead of rent. A bank deposit can be rent, a security deposit, an insurance payout or your own transfer. Logging deposits as income inflates your taxable rent and hides underpayment.
Deducting mortgage principal. Only the interest portion is deductible. The worksheet keeps principal and interest separate for exactly this reason.
Lumping improvements in with repairs. Fixing a leaking faucet is a repair you deduct this year. Replacing the whole kitchen is an improvement you depreciate. Putting both in "repairs" is one of the most common audit triggers for small landlords.
When a worksheet stops being enough
A worksheet is a record of what already happened. It cannot tell you that a lease expires in sixty days, that a renewal notice window closes next week, or that a tenant is now two months behind — it only knows what you remembered to type. Most landlords hit that wall between three and eight doors. PLINTH picks up where the worksheet stops: the same rent ledger and expense log, plus automatic alerts before renewal and termination dates pass.
Rental income and expense worksheet FAQs
- What is a rental income and expense worksheet?
- It is a single record of money in and money out for each rental you own. Income is the rent you invoiced and the rent that actually arrived — those are different numbers and the gap is the one that matters. Expenses are every dollar spent on the property, tagged with a category so it lands on the right line of your tax return. A worksheet that only totals a year of deposits is a bank statement with extra steps.
- What counts as rental income?
- Rent received during the year, advance rent, a forfeited security deposit you keep, tenant-paid expenses such as a repair bill they covered in lieu of rent, and lease cancellation fees. A refundable security deposit you still hold is not income — keep it out of the income column or you will pay tax on money you owe back.
- Which rental expenses can I deduct?
- Ordinary and necessary costs of operating the rental: mortgage interest (not principal), property tax, insurance, repairs and maintenance, cleaning, management and leasing fees, legal and professional fees, advertising, utilities you pay, supplies, auto and travel for property trips, and depreciation. Improvements that add value or extend the life of the property are capitalized and depreciated rather than deducted in one year.
- How often should I update the worksheet?
- Monthly, and it should take under ten minutes. Log rent as it lands and expenses as receipts arrive. Landlords who save it for tax season reliably lose a handful of deductions to receipts they cannot find and rent variances they can no longer explain.
- Does the worksheet work for multiple properties?
- Yes. It handles ten properties and twenty-four tenants out of the box, with per-property totals and a portfolio total, because a combined number hides the one unit quietly losing money each month.