While playing Mafia Wars, I play on Facebook, one of the main strategies is to figure out how to most efficiently use the resources you are given. As I was buying up properties in New York and building casinos and Valu-Marts, I never really knew if I was building my portfolio to its' maximum potential. I asked myself, "What would give me the best return for my dollar?" The more money I can make, the better buying power I will have, right?

I had already learned the "hot" tip to only buy properties and businesses in groups of 10. This gets you the best value, since each time you buy the price increases. But I still didn't know in what order I should build my empire.

So I created a "return" calculator to help. It calculates the return on your dollar over X amount of time. If you want money fast and quick, you might want to see what would give you the best return for your dollar in one day, but if you are going on a long vacation and won't be checking on your properties for two weeks, you might want to see what will give you the best return over two weeks.

As your empire grows, the return over the short term goes negative. This is due to the increase costs to add more businesses. When this happens, it is best to then increase the time for return and see what gives the best return at the next time frame.

Give the calculator a try here, and let me know what you think.