---
title: "What Is the Investment Profile in Padzilly and How Is It Used?"
description: "The two numbers behind every payment you see — and how to search below your approval."
url: https://homes-support.padzilly.com/en/articles/16-what-is-the-investment-profile-in-padzilly-and-how-is-it-used
collection: "Using Padzilly"
updated: 2026-10-01
language: en
alternates: [es]
---

# What Is the Investment Profile in Padzilly and How Is It Used?

The two numbers behind every payment you see — and how to search below your approval.

Your **investment profile** is the set of numbers Padzilly uses to decide which homes fit you. It is why your search results are different from everybody else's, and why the payment on a property page is yours rather than a generic estimate.

You will find it in **Profile**, under **Homebuying Budget**.

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### The two numbers that matter

**Max Monthly Payment** — the most you are willing to pay every month, with taxes, insurance, mortgage insurance and any HOA fee included.

**Funds available** — the cash you have for the down payment and closing costs.

Everything else on the screen adjusts these two.

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### Where they come from

There are two ways your profile gets filled in:

**From your linked loan.** If a loan officer has uploaded your approval, Padzilly builds the profile from the real loan. The screen will tell you plainly: _Approved up to $X/mo._ and _You have $X available._ This is the accurate version — it is your lender's own numbers, not an estimate.

**At sign-up.** Creating an account includes a step where Padzilly asks you for the two figures, so the search works from your first day even without a lender attached.

Either way, **you need an account.** Browsing as a guest does not let you set a profile — a guest sees a sign-up panel instead, and the payment and cash filters stay locked until there is a profile to filter against.

The linked-loan version gives you the most reliable payment and cash-to-close figures on every property, because there is no guessing involved.

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### You can search below your approval

This is the part most buyers do not realise, and it is worth knowing.

When your profile comes from a loan, the two figures are **locked to what your lender approved**. Padzilly says so on the screen: _Locked to your loan-approved cap of $X. Toggle the checkbox below to use a lower limit._

And that is exactly what you can do. There are two checkboxes:

-   **Search with lower payment** — then **Set your own payment limit**
    
-   **Search with less available cash** — then **Set how much cash you want to use**
    

So you can tell Padzilly to show you homes at $2,400 a month even though you are approved for $2,900.

**You can go down, never up.** The cap is the lender's decision and no setting here changes it. What you control is whether you shop at the top of it.

Most people should go down. Being approved for a payment is not the same as wanting to live with it for thirty years, and the homes you can comfortably afford are a better list than the homes you can barely afford.

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### Credits that reduce your cash

The profile also records credits that lower what you need to bring to closing:

-   Lender credit
    
-   Realtor credit
    
-   Builder credit
    
-   Employer credit
    
-   Buyer Assistance
    
-   Down payment assistance, up to an amount
    
-   Other credit
    

If you have been told you qualify for down payment assistance or a lender credit, put it here. It changes the cash-needed figure on every property you look at, and leaving it out makes every home look more expensive than it is.

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### Age-restricted communities

One more setting, with three choices:

-   **Include all homes**
    
-   **Exclude age-restricted communities**
    
-   **Search only age-restricted communities**
    

Age-restricted means 55-plus or similar communities. If you are not eligible, excluding them stops you falling for a home you cannot buy. If you are specifically looking for one, the third option makes that your whole search.

* * *

### Save before you go back

Changes are not applied until you save them. Save, then return to the search — your results and every payment figure will reflect the new profile.

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### If you have no loan yet

Then your profile is your own estimate, and Padzilly's numbers are only as good as what you typed. Be honest with yourself rather than optimistic: a payment you guessed at is not a payment anyone has approved. The fastest way to make the whole platform accurate is to invite your loan officer to upload your approval.