Guide
The total cost analysis, explained
What a TCA is, why the over-time view closes deals a rate quote cannot, and what it costs to deliver one with today's tools. Written for the advisor, facts checked August 2026.
What a TCA actually is
A total cost analysis puts two or three loan options next to each other and answers one question: what does each option cost this client over the years they will actually hold it? Rate and payment are the first row, never the whole story. The analysis tracks interest paid, principal paydown, and remaining balance over time, so a client planning to move in five years and a client planning to stay thirty can each see which option wins on their timeline.
Credit where it is due: Mortgage Coach made the Total Cost Analysis famous and built the advice-based selling movement around it. The idea outgrew any one product. Today a TCA is a genre, and the tools differ on how fast one gets built, whose brand it carries, and what the client can do with it once it arrives.
Why the over-time view wins
A client holding one rate quote has nothing to decide with, so they shop it. A client looking at three options over their own time horizon has a decision they can make on the call. The TCA moves the conversation from a number the client was trained to haggle over to arithmetic they can see, and the advisor who shows that math is the one who looks like the expert.
The practical wins show up in specific conversations: points versus no points, 15-year versus 30-year, buy now versus wait, refi now versus ride it out. Each is an over-time question, and each stalls without an over-time picture.
What delivering a TCA costs
| Tool | Published price | What you get |
|---|---|---|
| Mortgage Coach (TrustEngine) | $150 a month per user on the published individual plan | The original. The Total Cost Analysis is its signature deliverable, with an AI builder added in 2026. LOS integrations sit on an enterprise tier quoted at five seats or more. |
| WealthLens | From $99 a month, 30-day trial for $1 | Ships a True Cost Analysis module that sums interest, fees, mortgage insurance, and closing costs over any horizon, built from a property address in about sixty seconds and delivered as an interactive client Sandbox under your brand. |
| Mortgage Maker AI | $79 a month billed annually | AI-generated loan presentations in the classic side-by-side format, white-labeled. |
| Spreadsheets and PDFs | No subscription | The manual route. The real cost is your hour per client and a static file the client cannot explore. |
Prices restated from the vendors' published pages, checked August 2026. Tell us if something changed and we will update it.
The subscription is the smaller cost. The larger one is build time: a manual over-time comparison takes most of an hour per client. That hour is the reason most advisors deliver a TCA for the big deals and a rate quote for everyone else, which hands the everyday deals to whoever shows the math first.
The modern version of the deliverable
The format is evolving in two directions at once. Build time is collapsing: WealthLens turns a property address into a full multi-option strategy in about sixty seconds, with the 1003 imported by MISMO 3.4 file instead of typed. And the deliverable is coming alive: instead of a static analysis, the client receives an interactive Sandbox under your brand, moves the numbers on their own phone, and you see the engagement the moment it happens.
The analysis itself is deeper than one chart now. The WealthLens True Cost Analysis sits in a set of 22 analysis modules: Breakeven Horizon for the points decision, Cost of Waiting for the buy-now question, Wealth Accumulation for the 15-year versus 30-year debate, and a Refi Strategy Matrix for the other side of the business. One file feeds all of them.
Weighing the tools side by side? The buyer's guide to mortgage presentation software walks the seven axes, and the WealthLens vs Mortgage Coach page covers the head-to-head in detail.
Questions advisors ask
- What is a total cost analysis in mortgage lending?
- A total cost analysis, or TCA, is a side-by-side comparison of loan options that shows what each one costs over the years the client will actually hold the loan, not just the rate and payment on day one. It typically compares principal paydown, interest paid, and remaining balance across two or three scenarios so the client can pick based on their own timeline.
- Where does the term TCA come from?
- Mortgage Coach popularized the Total Cost Analysis as its signature client deliverable, and the term spread from there to describe the whole genre of over-time loan comparisons. Today several platforms produce this kind of analysis, each with its own format and delivery.
- What does total cost analysis software cost?
- Published pricing runs from $79 a month at the budget end to $150 a month for Mortgage Coach, the tool that coined the term. WealthLens Standard is $99 a month or $999 a year with a 30-day trial for $1. Figures come from the vendors' published pages and were checked in August 2026.
- Why show total cost instead of just the rate?
- Because the rate alone cannot answer the client’s real question, which is what the loan costs them over the time they keep it. A lower rate bought with points can lose to a higher rate over a short hold. The over-time view turns that from an argument into arithmetic the client can see.
- Can a client interact with a TCA?
- On the classic format the client reads a document or watches a recorded walkthrough. WealthLens delivers the analysis as an interactive Sandbox instead: the client moves the down payment, rate, or term on their own phone and watches every number update, and you see the moment they engage.
Build one for a real client, today.
Bring an address. Sixty seconds later your client is holding the over-time math, under your brand.
