Entering Dollar or Percentage Amount

[Doug_Ardy]

I’d like to calculate a Currency Figure {Loan Amount} based on either a exact dollar amount deduction or percentage (without having to enter both).

For example, if I want to calculate a {Loan Amount} from a {Purchase Price}, I can easily do this with a formula using either {Down Payment } OR {Down Payment %}. What I would like to do is to setup the fields so I can enter EITHER the {Down Payment } OR {Down Payment %}, and it would still correctly calculate the {Loan Amount}. To be clear, I don’t want to have to enter both the {Down Payment $} and {Down Payment %}, just one or the other.

Ideally, if I entered the {Down Payment %}, it would automatically update the {Down Payment } field and, vice versa. If I entered the {Down Payment } it would automatically update the {Down Payment %} field.

Is this possible in Airtable?

[JonathanBowen]

Hi @Doug_Ardy - you can’t do what you describe I’m afraid as a field can only be a data entry/selection field or a calculated field, not both at the same time. What I would do here is something like this:

You’ve got your purchase price, a downpayment field and a downpayment % field. You enter value or %. I’ve added an error check field which highlights if you’ve entered both by mistake. It uses the formula:

IF(AND({Down Payment $}, {Down Payment %}), '❌❌')

The Loan Amount is then:

IF(
  {Down Payment $}, 
  {Purchase Price} - {Down Payment $}, 
  {Purchase Price} - ({Purchase Price} * {Down Payment %})
)

You could then add two other fields to calculate the actual $ value and/or actual %.

JB

[Doug_Ardy]

JonathanBowen:

:x:

Thank you JB. Not an ideal work-around, but one I can probably live with. One quick other question, is it possible to hide or unhide fields based on a field value, or is that a manual only process?

[JonathanBowen]

Hi - no, you can’t hide based on a value or dynamically hide fields. What you could do though is create different views that show different fields. e.g. if the value you want to “trigger” the hiding is loan amount, you could make two views:

Loan Amount > $200k which shows fields 1, 2, 3 and 4
Loan Amount < $200k which shows fields 1, 2, 3 and 5

then just flip between the views (manually).

JB

[Doug_Ardy]

Thank you JB. I’m already using different views to create a ‘input’ view and an ‘output’ view, so I will implement this into those views. Still not ideal, but a reasonable compromise.