WiseAddressMethodology index

Ongoing Costs subscore (v1)

Version 1.0.0 · Published 2026-06-04

What this is

Ongoing Costs is one of three independent subscores rendered next to the Environmental Grade on every report. It summarizes the recurring obligations a buyer would inherit, distinct from the headline purchase price.

Tier definitions

  • $ — HOA and insurance both project to within buyer-set caps. Recurring spend is unlikely to surprise.
  • $$ — One of the two inputs lands in a band that warrants quote-shopping or HOA-bylaw review before bidding.
  • $$$ — Both inputs project high or one of them dramatically exceeds the buyer-set cap. The tier renders with a warning chevron on the report.

Tier escalation: any input firing the highest band escalates the whole subscore to $$$, even if the other input is benign. The buyer's mental model is "what is the worst recurring obligation here", not an arithmetic mean.

Inputs (at v1)

  • HOA fee: read from listing data when present; tier is set by comparing monthly HOA against the buyer's configured hoa-fee threshold. If the HOA field is missing from the listing, the verdict is n/a and the chip surfaces "HOA fee unknown".
  • Insurance band: modeled tier (Gold / Silver / Bronze / Uninsurable) using the property's year-built relative to FL post-2001 code-cycle revisions, county-level rate trends, and listed roof age when available. The model carries explicit confidence; older homes whose roof age is inferred get a borderline rather than a hard fail.

Provenance footer (round-6 condition)

Per the round-6 external review by Kimi K2.6 + DeepSeek V4 Pro (2026-06-04), every report renders the following text in the Ongoing Costs tooltip and in the tier's detail panel:

Cost figures from listing data + modeled insurance bands. Confirm all fees, taxes, and insurance directly before purchase. Does not capture all ongoing obligations.

The disclaimer travels with the tier so a screenshot of the chip carries its own context. Buyers should obtain real quotes; this subscore is a screening signal, not a binding estimate.

What this does not include (at v1)

  • Property-tax projection. Tied to county millage + Save Our Homes portability rules; deferred until the FL DOR feed lands.
  • Flood insurance specifically. FEMA NFIP rates require an elevation certificate to model accurately; for now we surface the FEMA flood-zone separately on the report.
  • Special assessments, CDD fees, capital reserves. These get their own line items in the Schools & Childcare and Neighborhood Amenities subscores or the BLUF prose; we don't collapse them into Ongoing Costs.
  • Mortgage and PMI. WiseAddress is intentionally lender-neutral.

Why a tier instead of a dollar amount

Listing HOA and modeled insurance carry materially different confidence. A buyer comparing five addresses needs a comparable signal at a glance; we surface the per-input dollar values inside the tier's detail panel so a click reveals the full breakdown, but the chip itself stays $/$$/$$$.

Versioning

Pinned at v1. Reports persist the subscore version so a v2 publish does not silently rewrite older citations.