Guide

Getting Started with Plat Num

A quick walkthrough of how to find, analyze, and evaluate development opportunities in Whatcom County.

Overview

Discover. Analyze. Track.

Top Candidates, For Sale, and Market Intel help you discover parcels and understand the market. Analyze turns one parcel into a decision, and Pipeline tracks the opportunities you choose to pursue.

Step 1 of 5

Find a parcel

Search by address or click any lot on the map. Plat Num queries county parcel, zoning, and geometry data before highlighting the selected parcel.

Advanced - Analyze tab

The Assembler

After selecting a parcel, click Add adjoining parcels to enter assemblage mode. Select up to 5 neighboring lots, then re-analyze the combined site to recompute every development concept on the merged footprint.

Step 2 of 5

Review ranked concepts

The Analyze panel ranks development concepts, shows whether renting or flipping is stronger, and keeps infeasible concepts visible when they explain a physical constraint.

Step 3 of 5

Open the pro forma

The full math view breaks each concept into acquisition, hard costs, soft costs, fees, carrying costs, valuation, and gross profit.

Step 4 of 5

Generate a report

Reports are printable screening packages with a concept render, parcel and zoning context, economics, applied rules, confidence notes, and disclaimers. Their saved links do not currently expire. Share links are quick, read-only snapshots that expire after 30 days.

Step 5 of 5

Track the opportunity

Save to Pipeline when a parcel is a real deal you want to move through screening, site visit, pro forma, offer, and close. Dismiss only hides a parcel from discovery lists; it does not create a tracked deal.

Also available

Discovery surfaces

These views help screen a neighborhood, price band, or zoning category without starting from one specific parcel.

Top Candidates

A pre-ranked list of development-screened parcels in the current map view. Filter by program, zone, lot size, price, margin, or yield on cost, then analyze any result.

$3.63m estimated
$1.18m estimated
$842k estimated

For Sale

Active listings overlaid with Plat Num development estimates, so asking price and development upside can be reviewed side by side.

Potential profit: -$184k
List price: $1.95m
Matched listing snapshot

Market Intel

Cap rates, rent assumptions, and market confidence labels feed the valuation line used across the pro forma and candidate rankings.

Cap rate: 6.0-7.5%
Rent: $1,400-$1,600
Confidence: Direct

Account help

Account and support

Start with these account actions. When the support inbox is available, the account menu opens a prefilled message with the current page and your numeric user ID only.

Create your account

Open signup

Verify your email

Open the verification message sent after signup and follow its one-time link before signing in to the product.

Open login

Manage billing

Choose a plan, change your subscription, or open the billing portal from the Billing page.

Open billing

Reset your password

Request a one-time reset link for your account email. Reset links expire and can be used only once.

Reset password

Delete your account

Use the account page to permanently delete your account after password confirmation and an explicit warning.

Open account

Contact support

Choose Contact support from your account menu to share the page where you need help. The draft does not add your name, email, query string, or other account details.

Reference

Development glossary

Development concept is Plat Num's name for a build-and-exit option. Asking price is the seller's advertised price. Purchase basis is the acquisition cost used in the model. Max bid is the highest price that still meets the selected return target.

Margin on cost: Gross profit ÷ total development cost × 100. Strong: 15% or more. Viable: 5% to under 15%. Marginal: 0% to under 5%. Negative: below 0%.
Yield on cost: Annual net operating income (NOI) divided by total development cost.
Cap rate: Annual net operating income (NOI) divided by property value.
Debt yield: Annual net operating income (NOI) divided by the loan amount.
DSCR: Annual net operating income (NOI) divided by annual debt payments.
LTC: Loan amount divided by total development cost.
LTV: Loan amount divided by stabilized property value.
Land residual: Value left for the property after development costs and the target return.
Max bid: The most you can pay for the property and still meet the selected return target.
Purchase basis: The acquisition cost used by the model, from the best available price source.
Stabilized value: Estimated property value after construction and lease-up.

Ready to start screening?

Try the representative sample first, or open Analyze and click any parcel on the map.

Try sample analysis Read methodology Open Analyze