A custom financial model, built on your numbers

A custom financial model is a spreadsheet that describes one business: yours. Its revenue logic matches how you actually sell, its costs are the costs you will actually pay, and every figure can be traced back to an assumption you can defend. StartupModel builds that model from a short questionnaire and your key numbers. You get an Excel file with live formulas, a low / base / high scenario switch and a Checks sheet. Light costs $149, Full costs $349, and you pay once.

This page explains what "custom" should mean, how to tell a model you can rely on from one that only looks finished, and what you get from us.

What "custom" should mean

Most people who search for a custom model have already tried something else. They opened a template and found it was built for another business. They asked a chatbot and got text rather than a working workbook. Or they got a quote from an analyst that was larger than the first year's marketing budget.

A model is custom when three things are true:

1. The revenue build matches your business. A café sells to customers per day at an average ticket. A software company sells subscriptions that renew and churn. A consulting firm sells billable hours. If the model forces your revenue into someone else's logic, every number that follows is wrong in a way nobody will notice until the bank asks.
2. The inputs are yours. Not a sample that you overwrite one cell at a time, hoping nothing breaks. Your opening traffic, your rent, your hiring plan, your loan.
3. You can change it. A model is a decision tool. If you can't change an assumption and watch the whole file follow, you have a report, not a model.

How to judge any financial model in ten minutes

I have reviewed a lot of models over the years, for lenders, boards and founders. The checks below catch most of the problems, whoever built the file.

• Click a revenue cell. You should see a formula pointing at an assumption, not a typed number. Pasted values are the most common way a model goes stale.
• Find the assumptions. Each one should sit in its own labelled cell, in one place. If growth rates are buried inside formulas, nobody can review them.
• Look across the columns. The same formula should run across every period. A formula that changes in month 7 usually hides a manual fix.
• Check the balance sheet. Assets must equal liabilities plus equity in every period, not just at year end. If there is no balance sheet, ask how cash was calculated.
• Change one assumption. Halve sales growth. Does cash fall? Does the loan still get repaid? If nothing moves, the model is not wired.
• Look for the downside. A single forecast is a guess. A lender or investor will ask what happens if sales come in lower. A model with a scenario switch answers that in one click.

What StartupModel builds

You answer a short questionnaire: business type, goal, stage, horizon (1, 3 or 5 years), monthly or annual detail, and a few key numbers. Sensible defaults fill anything you leave blank, and you can start from sample data.

Your answers become a structured brief of drivers, each with a low, base and high value. A tested template, written in code and the same for every customer, turns that brief into the workbook. No AI writes formulas into your file.

Light — $149

• Inputs sheet with every assumption in its own labelled cell
• P&L with period detail and an annual summary
• Low / base / high scenario switch
• Checks sheet

Full — $349

• Dashboard with the scenario selector
• Inputs, plus monthly (or annual) detail for revenue, costs, headcount, working capital, loan and equity
• Annual P&L, cash flow statement and balance sheet
• Headcount and payroll plan
• Checks sheet, including a balance-sheet check for every period

Both tiers come as a standard .xlsx with live formulas. Inputs are blue, calculations are black and links between sheets are green, so anyone can trace a number back to its source.

The part most models skip: proof

Before a model is released, the numbers are recomputed independently in plain Python, outside the spreadsheet, for every scenario and every year. The workbook must match that recomputation within $1. If it doesn't, the file is not sent.

The Checks sheet travels with the file. Its formulas run again every time you change an input. They confirm, among other things, that:

• annual revenue and net income tie to the period detail;
• EBITDA reconciles to gross profit and operating costs;
• closing cash equals the sum of all net cash flows;
• the balance sheet balances in every period (Full);
• the scenario selector is valid and the low / base / high values are ordered the right way.

When you send the model to a banker, an investor or your accountant, they can open that sheet and see the result for themselves.

Who it's for

• Loan applicants. Owners preparing a bank or SBA loan application who need projections with a balance sheet and cash flow, not just a P&L. See SBA loan financial projections.
• Founders raising money. People who need a forecast they can drop into a deck and defend in a meeting, with a downside case ready.
• Cafés, restaurants and local businesses. Owners planning an opening or a second site. See restaurant and coffee shop financial projections.
• Accountants and advisers. Firms that build forecasts for clients and want a clean, checked starting point. A pack of 5 Full models costs $1,250.

Custom model vs. the usual alternatives

A good analyst still adds things a template can't: judgement on your market and a conversation about your plan. If you need that, hire one. If you need a sound, checked model built on your numbers first, start here, and take it to your adviser for review.

Questions

Can I edit the model after I download it? Yes. It is a normal Excel file. Change any blue input and every sheet recalculates.

Which industries are covered? Today: restaurants and cafés, SaaS and software, retail and e-commerce, professional services, rental real estate, fitness studios and gyms, and home services and trades. More follow. If yours isn't listed yet, the questionnaire will say so before you pay.

What if the model doesn't fit my business? Write to us within 7 days and we refund the full amount.

Is the model approved by a bank or the SBA? No model is. Lenders judge your plan, not the spreadsheet vendor. What we guarantee is that the arithmetic is consistent and checked.

Build my model — from $149