Owner Scorecard


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DFH, Dream Finders Homes Inc.

Homebuilders capital-intensive

We design, build and sell homes primarily in high-growth markets using our asset-light lot acquisition strategy.

Our home offerings are marketed under various brands, including Dream Finders Homes, DF Luxury, Reverie Active Adult Lifestyle by Dream Finders Homes, Craft Homes and Coventry Homes.

March 2025 Expanded Jet HomeLoans' mortgage servicing capabilities through an acquired mortgage licensing platform with a Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation and Government National Mortgage Association-approved lender.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K
DFH · Dream Finders Homes Inc.
I

The business

What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.

Revenue · FY2025
$4.3B
−2.9% YoY · 31% 5-yr CAGR
Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average
Revenue $4.2B 5-yr avg $3.6B
Gross margin 26% 5-yr avg 18%
Operating margin 5.5% 5-yr avg 9.0%
ROIC 6% 5-yr avg 45%
Owner-earnings margin −3% 5-yr avg 1%
Free cash flow margin −3% 5-yr avg 1%

The business in brief

read the 10-K →

What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.

What moves the needle
Gross margin has run about 16% and operating margin about 7.8% through the cycle, a thin spread that turns the result on volume and the cost of what it sells far more than on the price it sets. Inventory runs near 43% of sales, so how fast it turns back into cash — and the risk of writing it down when demand softens — sits alongside the margin. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on pricing power & competition, set against the numbers in what the filing emphasizes, below.
Is it a good business?
Return on capital has run high across the record (median 41%, above 15% in 3 of 5 years), though buybacks and expensed R&D and brands shrink the capital base, so the figure overstates the underlying economics. The steadier read is owner earnings: roughly 3% of revenue reaches owners as cash, though it swings. Whether these returns reflect real pricing power or an accounting artifact is the judgment the 10-K is for.

Every line is arithmetic on the company's filings, shown in full in the sections below.

II

The record

Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.

The record, 2019–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left
2019’192020’202021’212022’222023’232024’242025’25TTMTTMMar 2026
Income statement
$744M$1.1B$1.9B$3.3B$3.7B$4.4B$4.3B$4.2BRevenueRevenue
14%15%16%19%20%26%Gross marginGross mgn
9%8%8%8%8%9%11%11%SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
$39M$80M$149M$344M$392M$433M$284M$231MOperating incomeOp. inc.
5.3%7.1%7.8%10.3%10.5%9.7%6.6%5.5%Operating marginOp. mgn
$39M$79M$121M$262M$296M$335M$217M$176MNet incomeNet inc.
0%0%18%24%25%22%23%24%Effective tax rateTax rate
Cash flow & returns
$30M$97M$65M($28M)$374M($257M)($101M)($105M)Operating cash flowOp. cash
$3M$4M$6M$11M$11M$10M$15M$17MDepreciationDeprec.
($13M)$13M($67M)($308M)$54M($621M)($358M)($319M)Working capital & otherWC & other
$3M$3M$3M$6M$5M$25M$26M$28MCapexCapex
0.4%0.3%0.1%0.2%0.1%0.6%0.6%0.7%Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$28M$94M$62M($33M)$369M($267M)($116M)($122M)Owner earningsOwner earn.
3.7%8.3%3.2%−1.0%9.9%−6.0%−2.7%−2.9%Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$28M$94M$62M($33M)$369M($282M)($126M)($133M)Free cash flowFCF
3.7%8.3%3.2%−1.0%9.9%−6.3%−2.9%−3.2%Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$13M$17M$519M$280K$0$178M$184M$73MAcquisitionsAcquis.
$0$0$8M$42MBuybacksBuybacks
69%94%41%15%8%6%ROICROIC
30%41%32%27%15%12%Return on equityROE
30%41%32%27%15%12%Retained to equityRetained/eq
Balance sheet
$51M$44M$227M$365M$494M$274M$235M$435MCash & investmentsCash+inv
$17M$33M$43M$31M$34M$39M$33MReceivablesReceiv.
$484M$1.1B$1.1BInventoryInvent.
$501M$1.1B$43M$31M$34M$39M$1.1BOperating working capitalOper. WC
$29M$172M$172M$172M$300M$377M$377MGoodwillGoodwill
$734M$1.9B$2.4B$2.6B$3.3B$3.7B$4.0BTotal assetsAssets
$30M$3M$0$294M$1.3B$1.6B$1.9BTotal debtDebt
($14M)($224M)($365M)($200M)$1.0B$1.4B$1.5BNet debt / (cash)Net debt
178.0×91.8×222.1×10756.4×7230.3×Interest coverageInt. cov.
$401M$645M$925M$1.2B$1.4B$1.4BShareholders’ equityEquity
0.1%0.1%0.3%0.2%0.4%0.4%0.6%0.5%Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
Per share
0K0K95.3M107M106M100M101M92.4MShares out (diluted)Shares
$20.19$31.33$35.35$44.37$42.68$45.67Revenue / shareRev/sh
$1.27$2.46$2.79$3.34$2.14$1.90EPS (diluted)EPS
$0.65$-0.31$3.48$-2.66$-1.14$-1.32Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$0.65$-0.31$3.48$-2.81$-1.25$-1.44Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$0.03$0.05$0.05$0.25$0.25$0.30Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$4.21$6.04$8.72$12.41$14.06$15.31Book value / shareBVPS
Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded
6-yr5-yr
Revenue / share+20.6%/yr (4-yr)+20.6%/yr (4-yr)
EPS+14.0%/yr (4-yr)+14.0%/yr (4-yr)
Capital spending / share+72.0%/yr (4-yr)+72.0%/yr (4-yr)
Book value / share+35.2%/yr (4-yr)+35.2%/yr (4-yr)

The record, charted

FY2019–2025

Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked.

Share count
101Mpeak FY2022
ROIC
8%low FY2025
Gross margin
20%low FY2019
Net debt ÷ owner earnings
-0.5×peak FY2020

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

The accountant's number, and the cash an owner can take; the gap is the tell.

($116M)owner earningsvs.$217Mnet incomelow FY2024

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetainedBeyond op. cash

Each year's outlays against its operating cash: the mix, and how it drifts. The hatched cap is spending beyond that year's operating cash — financed from the balance sheet or borrowing, not operations.

FY2019FY2023

Net income is the accountant's number; owner earnings is the cash an owner could take out. The walk between them, off the cash-flow statement, and whether the gap is widening or holding.

In fiscal 2025 the business earned ($116M) of owner earnings, the operating cash left after the $15M it takes just to hold its position. It put $11M more into growth; free cash flow, after that spending, was ($126M).

FY2025FY2024FY2023FY2022FY2021
Reported net income$217M$335M$296M$262M$121M
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back+$15M+$10M+$11M+$11M+$6M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost+$25M+$19M+$14M+$7M+$5M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items−$358M−$621M+$54M−$308M−$67M
Cash from operations($101M)($257M)$374M($28M)$65M
Maintenance capital expenditurethe spending needed just to hold position and volume−$15M−$10M−$5M−$6M−$3M
Owner earnings($116M)($267M)$369M($33M)$62M
Growth capital expenditurediscretionary; spent to get bigger, not to stand still−$11M−$15M
Free cash flow($126M)($282M)$369M($33M)$62M
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue-3%-6%10%-1%3%

Owner earnings is the cash an owner could pull out without starving the business: operating cash less the maintenance capital it must spend to hold its position (here about $15M, roughly its depreciation, the rate its assets wear out). The other $11M of its capital spending is growth it chose, not upkeep it owed; charged only with the maintenance it must do, the business earns well more than the year's free cash flow shows. The cash-flow statement also adds stock comp back as non-cash, but it is a real cost paid in shares; counted as the expense it is (less $25M), owner earnings is nearer ($141M).

Much of fiscal 2025's profit didn't arrive as operating cash; it sits in “working capital & other” above. That can be a real inventory or timing swing, or profit that doesn't run through operating cash at all: a heavy tax year, equity-method earnings, or investment income booked through investing. For a year like this, owner earnings understates the cash earned; the full cash-flow statement carries the rest.

Maintenance capex is estimated as depreciation where a growing business invests above it; free cash flow is the figure the scorecard's free-cash margin reads.

III

Quality & stewardship

Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.

Owner’s Scorecard

FY2025 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

  • Comfortable
    Operating income $284M ÷ interest expense $32K
    What this means

    Operating profit covers interest with the kind of margin Graham wanted for a defensive holding. Necessary, not sufficient, it says solvent, not cheap.

  • How heavy is the debt, net of cash? $1.4B · 4.8× operating profit
    Heavy net debt
    Cash $235M − debt $1.6B
    What this means

    Netting $235M of cash and short-term investments against $1.6B of debt leaves $1.4B owed, about 4.8× a year's operating profit (5.7× on the gross debt, before the cash). Net debt is the leverage figure that matters: the cash is already set against the debt. Strategic or illiquid investments aren't counted here.

  • Not enough data
    What this means

    The filing data didn't include the inputs for this check.

Is it a good business?

  • Very high (≥25%) through the cycle
    5-yr median, range 8%–94%; 8% latest = NOPAT $217M ÷ invested capital $2.8B
    Industry peers: median 8%
    What this means

    The rate the business earns on the money tied up in it, Buffett's north star, because over time a stock tracks the ROIC beneath it. Above ~15% sustained hints at a moat; a return below the cost of capital (~8%) erodes value as a business grows rather than building it — the test Buffett weighs most. The headline is the median of the last 5 years (it ran 8% most recently), so one peak or trough year doesn't set the verdict. Asset-light businesses (R&D expensed, little capital) read artificially high, pair this with Owner Earnings.

  • Thin through the cycle
    7-yr median margin, range -6%–10%; latest ($116M) = operating cash ($101M) − maintenance capex $15M
    Industry peers: median 4%
    What this means

    What an owner could take out without starving the business: operating cash less the maintenance capital it must spend to hold its position — Buffett's owner earnings. That's -3% of revenue this year, a 3% median across 7 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $25M of SBC) leaves ($141M).

  • Thinly cash-backed
    Cash from ops ($101M) ÷ net income $217M

    In the filing’s words Read against the cash, reported earnings have run ahead of the operating cash the business generated over the record, and a manipulation screen of eight balance-sheet ratios trips on it. For an inventory- or content-heavy grower that can be cash tied up in real assets as it expands; elsewhere it can mean the earnings lean on accounting estimates — the cash-flow statement against the income statement is where to tell which.

    What this means

    How much of reported profit showed up as operating cash. Above 1× is reassuring; well below suggests earnings lean on accruals. One year is noisy, growth and working-capital swings distort it, and this is operating cash, not free cash. Watch the multi-year trend.

How is the cash used?

  • No surplus to allocate
    What this means

    The business didn't generate positive Owner Earnings this year, so any distributions came from the balance sheet or borrowing, not from operations.

  • Investing or harvesting? 1.71×
    Expanding
    Capex $26M ÷ depreciation $15M
    What this means

    Descriptive, not a grade. Above ~1× means investing faster than assets wear out (growth, or, sustained for years, today's earnings carrying less depreciation than tomorrow's will). Below means spending less than it's wearing out (efficiency, or a melting asset base). The ratio won't tell you which; the filings will.

Graham’s defensive tests · 3 of 4 met

Graham’s numerical criteria for the defensive investor (The Intelligent Investor, ch. 14), run on the filings. A floor of safety, not a buy signal; many fine modern businesses fail his strictest liquidity rules by design.

  • Adequate size Pass
    Revenue ≥ $2B · $4.3B
    What this means

    Big enough to weather a storm. Graham's 1972 floor was ~$100M of sales (≈ $700M today); we use a $2B revenue line as a conservative modern stand-in.

  • Strong liquidity
    Current ratio ≥ 2× ·
    What this means

    Current assets / liabilities not in the data yet.

  • Earnings stability Pass
    A profit every year (7-yr record) · no losses
    What this means

    Graham wanted earnings in each of the past ten years, the stability a defensive owner leans on.

  • Dividend record Miss
    Uninterrupted dividends · none paid
    What this means

    An unbroken dividend was Graham's mark of durability. He wanted twenty years; the filings show about ten, and a single suspension breaks the streak. Non-payers, many fine modern compounders, fall outside his defensive net by design.

  • Earnings growth Pass
    Earnings +33% over the record · +254%
    What this means

    At least a third more earnings than a decade ago, averaging three years at each end. Net income (not per-share), so stock splits don't distort it, buybacks and dilution show up in the share-count line instead.

  • Moderate price
    P/E ≤ 15 and P/E × P/B ≤ 22.5 · decided by the price
    What this means

    Graham's valuation gate, the wall he kept between a sound business and a sound investment. Three-year average earnings are $3.07/share (latest year $2.36), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $15.48/share. Enter a price in “What the price implies” just below for the P/E, P/B, and whether it clears. But this is the rule Buffett outgrew: there's no hard P/E law, and a wonderful business can deserve a far richer multiple if the thesis holds, treat it as the bargain-hunter's floor, not a verdict on the price.

Durability & moat, 2019–2025

Whether the record’s returns held, and what the capital reinvested earned.

  • Profitable years 7 of 7
    What this means

    Never lost money over the record, the earnings stability Graham insisted on.

  • Return on capital ≥ 15% 3 of 5 yrs
    What this means

    A moat shows up as a high return on invested capital that holds year after year, not one good vintage.

  • Operating margin 7% → 9% (3-yr avg ends)

    In the filing’s words The filing ties gains to its own pricing, but names price competition too — pricing power that is real yet contested, not unopposed. The margin shows who is winning.

    What this means

    Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about 7% early to 9% lately, median 8% — pricing power intact or improving.

  • Reinvestment, incremental ROIC 13%
    What this means

    Reinvested capital came back at only a modest incremental return — near the cost of capital, where extra growth adds little per dollar. The record shows whether it is a soft stretch or a thinning moat.

  • Worst year 2019 · 5.3% op. margin
    What this means

    Stayed profitable even in its hardest year, the resilience that survives recessions.

Does AI threaten the moat?

Low contestability

The moat is physical, regulated or balance-sheet-funded, the kind AI cuts costs within but does not contest.

In its own filing Named as a competitive risk

Its FY2025 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat.

“Competitors or other entities may integrate AI into their information systems and business operations more swiftly or effectively than us, potentially impairing our competitive edge and negatively impacting our financial performance.”

AI is unlikely to contest a moat that is physical, regulated or balance-sheet-funded; here it reads more as a cost tool than a threat.

Read from the filing's own risk factors, paired with the industry's structure under its SIC code; the durability is read above, the price below.

All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.

How the cash was used, 2019–2025

Over the record, the business generated $182M of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash builder, a large share of cash simply built up on the balance sheet.

  • Reinvested$70M · 39%
  • Buybacks$50M · 27%
  • Retained (debt / cash)$62M · 34%
  • Returned to owners$50M

    36% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $0 as dividends and $50M as buybacks.

  • Source of fundingOperating cash

    Operating cash covered reinvestment and returns; over the span cash and short-term investments rose $385M.

  • Average price paid for buybacks$23.32

    Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 2M shares were bought for $50M, about $23.32 each.

  • Net change in share count−3.0%

    The diluted count fell from 95M to 92M, so the buybacks outran the stock issued to staff.

  • Dividend record

    No dividend line was reported in the filing data over the span; the record here neither confirms nor rules out a payout.

  • Return on what it retained−5%

    Of the earnings it kept rather than paid out ($1.3B over the span), annual owner earnings (first three years vs last three) fell $66M, so each retained $1 gave back about 0.05 of yearly owner earnings. Buffett's test, run on owner earnings instead of market value.

Buybacks are gross of stock issued to staff; the share-count line above is the net of that, the figure that decides whether owners gained. The average price paid blends a year of purchases (and any accelerated repurchase), so it is close, not exact. The record of where the cash went and on what terms.

Acquisitions & goodwill

from the balance sheet & the 7-year cash-flow record

Goodwill grows only when a company acquires and falls only when it concedes it overpaid. The size of that bet, the cash put into buying rather than building, and how much has already been written off.

Goodwill & intangibles$382M10% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired
Against book equity26%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital
Cash spent acquiring$912Mover 7 years buying other businesses, against $70M of capital spent building

None written down over the record; the goodwill is still carried at full cost. That is the deals holding their value on the books so far; whether they keep doing so is the test an owner watches, since the write-down, when it comes, is the admission the price was too high.

Goodwill, acquired intangibles and equity from the latest balance sheet; acquisition spend and write-downs summed across the 7-year record, from the company's own filings.

Management, ownership & pay

read the proxy →

From the proxy: how much of the business the people running it own, and how they are paid, beside what the business earned for its owners in the same years.

Fiscal yearChief executivePay, as filed“Actually paid”Owner earnings
2021Mr. Zalupski$14.4M$12.7M$62M
2022Mr. Zalupski$8.3M$3.8M($33M)
2023Mr. Zalupski$11.4M$26.4M$369M
2024Mr. Zalupski$12.9M$7.6M($267M)
2025Mr. Zalupski$10.2M$7.8M($116M)

Both pay figures are the company’s own, from the pay-versus-performance table its proxy statement files. “As filed” is the Summary Compensation Table total: salary, bonus, and equity awards at their value on the day of grant. “Actually paid” is the SEC’s prescribed recalculation, which re-marks those equity awards to what they became as they vested; it can swing far above or below the filed figure in either direction, and negative years occur. Owner earnings are the whole business's, from the record above, for the same fiscal years.

  • Insider ownership16.8%

    The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.

  • Stock-based compensation$25M

    The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 1% of revenue, equal to 9% of operating profit. Buffett's oldest accounting fight: this is compensation, compensation is an expense, real whether or not the headline earnings admit it. One trap: the cash-flow statement adds SBC back, so the operating cash, and the owner earnings drawn from it, are flattered by exactly this amount; counted as the cost it is, what an owner keeps is lower.

Inverting the record

Invert: instead of why Dream Finders Homes Inc. is a good business, the question is what would make owning it a mistake, and whether those marks are in the record. Disconfirming tests across 2019–2025.

2 of the 4 tests turned up something to look into; the other 2 came back clean.

  • Look hereIs it less profitable than it was?0.4% vs 5.1%

    The owner-earnings margin averaged 5.1% early in the record and 0.4% across the last three years, and the latest year has not recovered. Ask the filing whether that is a structural drift or a cyclical trough — price, mix, cost, or a competitor — and whether it is permanent.

  • Look hereDid reported profit become cash?0.13×

    Across the record the business reported $1.4B of net income but generated $182M of operating cash, a 0.13-to-one conversion. Profit that does not turn into cash over many years is the classic mark of earnings that are softer than they look. Ask where the gap sits, receivables, inventory, or costs being capitalized rather than expensed.

And these came back clean
  • Did the share count rise anyway?
  • Are "one-time" charges a yearly habit?

Each test is read from the filings and is noisy alone; a flag can mark a cyclical trough or a year of heavy investment as easily as a problem. The filing says which.

What an owner would ask, FY2025

read the 10-K →
  • Which reported numbers are a judgment call?
    Management names Revenue recognition, Acquisitions as critical estimates

    each rests partly on management's judgment; the filing's note sets out the assumptionsverify →

The questions the record and the charts do not answer on their own; each carries the figure and the place to look.

Peers, Homebuilders

The same industry, side by side on owner economics. Each figure is a through-cycle median, so a peak or trough year can’t distort it; the group median at the foot is the line to read each against.

CompanyRevenueGross marginOp. marginROICOwner earn. margin
TMHCTaylor Morrison Home Corporation$8.1B20%9.1%8%10%
KBHKB Home$6.2B8.8%15%5%
MHOM/I Homes Inc.$4.4B23%11.0%20%3%
DFHDream Finders Homes Inc.$4.3B16%7.8%41%3%
CCSCentury Communities Inc.$4.1B7.9%6%-1%
ECGEverus Construction Group Inc.$3.7B12%6.7%29%4%
HOVHovnanian Enterprises Inc.$3.0B1.8%3%7%
BZHBeazer Homes USA Inc.$2.4B16%3.9%5%3%
Group median16%7.8%11%4%
IV

The price

What a price has to assume.

What the price implies

reverse-DCF

Type today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what Dream Finders Homes Inc. has delivered.

Dream Finders Homes Inc.’s latest year shows negative owner earnings, below the record’s own through-cycle owner earnings. So the tool opens on the through-cycle base, the cash it would earn at rest; clear the toggle below to read the latest year exactly as reported.

$

Through the cycle, Dream Finders Homes Inc. earns about $140M on its 3.2% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s −2.7% margin runs below that; the reported figure may understate a lean year. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year.

Base

The assumptions

9.0% = the 4.55% 10-year Treasury (Jul 15, 2026) + 4.45 points of equity premium. The rate you require is yours to set.

Enter a price above to run it.

Implied by the price
Owner-earnings growth, delivered
Owner-earnings yield
P/E (3-yr earnings ’23–’25)
P/B
Graham’s price gate

Graham capped the multiple at 15×; Buffett and Munger let that rule go: a wonderful business can deserve 50× if the thesis holds. The gate marks the bargain-hunter's floor.

Against a high-grade bond: Graham’s yardstick bond yield%

Prefilled with the 10-year Treasury (4.55%, as of Jul 15, 2026). Edit it for today’s exact figure, or a AAA corporate yield.

Graham measured a stock against the bond you could own instead, the heart of his margin of safety. Enter a price above to weigh the owner-earnings yield against this bond.

Free cash flow ($133M) on 92M shares outstanding (a weighted basic average, the only count this filer tags); net debt $1.5B. The base opens on the through-cycle figure (the latest year sits off the record’s own median, and Graham’s averaging cuts both ways); clear Normalize to use the year as filed. Net of stock comp treats option pay as the expense it is. Capex ($28M) runs well above depreciation ($17M), so this is a build-out; Steady-state swaps total capex for maintenance (≈ depreciation), lifting the base to about ($120M), the cash it would throw off if it stopped expanding. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Dream Finders Homes Inc. (DFH), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/DFH, data as of 2026-07-09.

Manual order: ← DELL its page in the Manual DFIN →

Industry order: ← CVCO the Homebuilders chapter DHI →