Help finding a general contractor in Worcester

[Chris Michel]

Greetings everyone, 

I would like some help finding a General Contractor; someone with a Construction Supervisor License (CSL) or Trade License in Worcester. Ideally, I want to take them with me to open houses so I know exactly how much a property would cost me in rehab cost and I can price my offer accordingly.

+1 if they have experience with 203k rehab and understand what's needed for a rental property. 

Does anyone have someone like this they can recommend in Worcester? Please only refer someone you have personally worked with and enjoyed the experience.

[Jonathan Bombaci]

We have a couple contractors that we use for 203k and construction projects however given the state of the market they're all very busy right now and to my knowledge none of them will go to open houses to build out a budget for free. Most of them work during the week and take weekends off so to get them out there on a saturday or sunday will be calling in a favor. Plus think about it, you may go to 10 houses to put in 3 offers and you'll be lucky if you get 1 out of 5 offers if you're trying to get a good deal. A good contractor who is booked solid during the week isn't going to have time to do that for free unless you have a strong personal relationship with them. Sometimes we do see this when our buyer's dad or uncle or something is a contractor but it is extremely rare right now. 

We work with a lot of buyers doing rehab and 203k properties and normally the way we do it is we rough size the budget with our clients during the open house (new siding, kitchen, bath, 1000sqft of floor, etc) and write that rough estimate into the offer. For example we say our offer is for $300,000 assuming we have a rehab budget below $50,000 and then during the inspection contingency (7-10 days) we bring in the contractor (normally during a weekday) to walk the house and build out the construction budget. Once you have something Under Agreement and they know if their price is right they'll get a job they're happy to come out and do the work. Then if the budget comes in at $45,000 you're good to move forward if it comes in at $75,000 you can use the budget and your inspection contingency to either renegotiate your offer or walk away and get your $1000 deposit back. Doing it this way makes it so you don't burn the contractors time (the good ones wont let you) and it makes it so you're protected and still have the ability to renegotiate if we miss something during the open house. 

I hope this helps. If you're interested in doing it this way let me know and I can introduce you to a contractor that we use on some of our 203k projects but they'll want to operate this way and come out when you think you have a good project under agreement. 

Best, 
Jon