Any Realtors Monetizing the project management of OOS BRRRRs?

[Russell Holmes]

I'm curious to hear other Realtors thoughts on this. I work primarily with investors as a Realtor, many of these investors recently being from out of state. I've sold some flips, house hacks, buy and holds, and closed a BRRRR today starting work Friday. Some retail and distressed sales in the mix, so there's no one single investing niche they've all been in other than generally single family and small multi.

These out of state investors I've worked with wish to purchase properties in my market for various reasons, and due to the distance are typically looking for minor rehabs or move-in-ready properties for a good deal. I'm more than happy to field contractor quotes, shoot video, take measurements, etc to help analyze the deals and get rehab lined up for post-closing. I don't charge anything for this part for now, to me it's part of being a good investor friendly Realtor and I get repeat business and referrals out of it. I make my commission, I don't charge a transaction fee, and I'm good with it. As an added bonus, I'm using all the same contacts I have used on previous JV deals or other client flips, picking the best of each I know and finding new leads for those I wasn't happy with . All along building a 'go-to' team for myself or others through personal experience. I find that Contractors really don't care if it's me writing a check for my deal or a client paying them for a deal I found but don't own, they thank me for the business either way, especially when I stay involved to check in on things and keep everyone honest. I think this relationship building has an intangible value to my own future investing that is huge.

So far, I've mainly worked rehabs for clients as 'boots on the ground' with those that have some experience putting new cabinets in a kitchen of their own or into a flip elsewhere. They are thousands of miles away so they won't come DIY the work, but they understand what's involved. It's easier to pick cabinet boxes with someone by email who has hung cabinet boxes before compared to one who hasn't. They may have rehabbed a bathroom once before or laid some LVP. On a recent JV flip, I was very involved, but profit in the deal was my payment for it. So I'm doing the local part of measuring spaces, advising materials due to the comps, establishing and fine tuning a scope of work for client and contractor to agree on, etc, basically making sure things go smoothly and clients are well informed of all options/costs. But they're shouldering the part of picking cabinets and fixtures to order for now. However, as I build these contractor relationships, measure and sketch kitchens, and make suggestions on which cabinet boxes to order or whether granite or laminate belongs, I've started to see that it would be pretty straightforward to package it into somewhat of a 'service'. I've got a great contractor who doesn't need micromanagement, but I also don't like asking contractors to make design decisions. Curious if anyone has done something similar for out of state investors buying BRRRRs and buy and hold deals in their market.

My thought is that I'll keep doing what I'm doing with the novice-rehab investors who want to dive in and pick cabinets.  I'm happy to make suggestions, discuss options, and move forward with deal after deal.  The repeat and referral business is worth it. With an investor client who really doesn't know the first thing about what goes where, it may be a first deal, rehabs are scary, so far only selling rent ready rehabs to these types of buyers,  I think having a somewhat turn key light rehab option would be great.  I could quite easily put together a scope of work detailed down to the item numbers of the cabinet boxes and light fixtures. I have roofers, tile guys, electricians, etc I can field quotes from.  I'm already finding certain cabinets, fixtures, materials I like using in rehabs over and over, so over time I can see having a list of the go-to products to put together the order for a new kitchen or bathroom quite easy.  Same goes for vanities, toilets, flooring, doors, etc.  If during due diligence I was able to establish a solid scope of work with every material listed, a solid rehab bid or bids, and manage the schedule through to completion, I can see that being worth something. I already end up doing most all of this, but it's typically spread between due diligence period and some post-closing.  More efficiency and potentially monetizing it is what I'm considering.  The investor would then be able to review everything to see what's involved and make any requested changes, but they wouldn't have to pick it all from scratch.

 I wouldn't be on site managing like a true 'project manager' who works for a GC, but I'm booking the fumigation around the demo, the granite around the cabinet install.  I'm making sure this or that is done when it's supposed to be and at the end turning it over to a PM or a tenant if they self manage (I don't do Property Management).  I'm trying to decide if this is something that could be offered as a package deal in a sense, in exchange for something like a $500 transaction fee at closing.... or if it would be something that would be a fee based service paid after rehab is done.   

I'm not asking for the legal side of charging the transaction fee, that varies state to state and broker to broker, I'll talk to mine about that part.  But I'm curious to hear of creative ways investor friendly realtors help their out of state buyers and make it a win/win, possibly monetizing and scaling that 'in between' job of managing vendors to get these deals rehabbed and rented.  It's a great learning experience for now, but in time it's something I'd like to scale so I'd likely have to monetize it to offer it on every deal.

I could see down the road hiring non-licensed assistants to shoot videos, measure kitchens and bathrooms, meet contractors, etc.  My wife and I do have a team through our brokerage that we could run these expenses through as costs of sale, but tossing around the the execution of it and open to ideas/discussion.  Any thoughts?