Purpose
The purpose of this post is to explain the Control Panel which can be found in nearly all models in the CRE Suite. The control panel is primarily used to navigate through the Inputs tab and to track your progress while filling out the model. There are also a few additional features found in the Control Panel that may not currently be available in every model, but will be in the near future.
Location
The Control Panel can be found at the top right corner of the Inputs tab next to the Return Summary. The image below shows the Control Panel from the Commercial Acquisition Model which currently has all of the available features.
Navigation Buttons
You’ll find a variety of buttons located on the Control Panel. The “Show All”, “Hide All”, and the buttons aligned with Completion Checklist are the Navigation Buttons. Clicking on any of these buttons will make visible only the section that was labelled on the button, as well as the Return Summary and General Info up top. This allows the user to focus on a single section while underwriting and is a useful tool for running quick sensitivity analysis to compare with the Return Summary. The “Show All” button will make all sections visible, while the “Hide All” button will hide all sections.
Completion Checklist
The Completion Checklist allows the user to track their progress while filling out the Inputs tab. Clicking on any of the cells under “Complete” will allow the user to select “Y” for “Yes this is complete” or “N” for “No this is not complete”. This is especially useful when the model is changing hands between multiple users who are working on it. If the model is handed off to someone to finish up, they can easily see what sections need to be completed by quickly glancing at the Completion Checklist.
Enable Iterations
Before explaining this feature you may be asking, what are iterations? Iterations are how many times the model calculates whenever a change is made to an input. The reason CREModels uses iterations is because some models (usually development models) require circular references to calculate certain lines (prime example being Interest Reserve). Iterations should automatically be enabled when opening a CRE Suite model, however some versions of Excel and/or users settings may block this. Clicking this button is another way to make sure that iterations are enabled. If you’ve finished filling out the inputs and returns don’t appear to be correct or you notice error messages anywhere in the model, try clicking “Enable Iterations.”
NOTE: Some models may not have this button, but have no worry! You can still manually enable iterations from your Excel settings by following the instructions on this post: Enable Iterations in Excel
Prepare to Print/Unhide Report Rows
These buttons allow the user to quickly prep their reports before printing them off. The “Prepare to Print” button will quickly hide all unused rows on all reports to help the reports appear clean and consolidated. The “Unhide Report Rows” button will, as the name suggests, unhide all previously hidden rows.
Note: This is a new feature, as new features roll out keep an eye out for these updates in your template. If you don’t see this, please contact support at 201-252-7487.
View Reports Online (currently only available in the Commercial Acquisition Model)
This link will direct the user to the CRE Suite online portal where they can view and manage their projects online. The user may be prompted to log in after clicking on the link.
Note: The online reports currently only function with the Commercial Acquisition Model. The CRE Suite online portal is undergoing renovations which will allow other model types to be accessibl