Criminal/Civil Background Checks on GC/Project Managers

[Jacob Beg]

I have been struggling to find a GC for the budget I had in mind. There was a degree of complacency on my part due to familial circumstances and that the property is out of state and I was overly hesitant to be done over by an unscrupulous GC/project manager etc. 

A GC referred me to a project manager/engineer who is able to draw designs and see through the entire rehab cycle which sounded like the perfect man for the job. The PM demanded $100 to visit the property to consider design options etc. I have three projects  and since he spoke about his engineering background, well-spoken and sounded like he knew what he was talking about I agreed to pay $300 for the initial visit to the 3 properties. He immediately started to hound me about the $300 payment which I made, of course. 

At some point, I started to become desperate to get the project started as it was sitting idle for over two months as I have probably not managed the entire thing as best as I could. I signed the contract for close to 40K with the PM to act as the PM, GC etc. He seem easy to get along with minus the initial hounding of the $300 payment.

He demanded 20K upfront which isn't permitted in MD. I had to remind him he cannot demand more than 33% which he immediately agreed. The overly accommodating and agreeable attitude was the draw but also made me uneasy for some reason. I ran his name through MD's open judicial database where one can lookup someone by their full name. 

It turns out that the gentleman has been prosecuted and involved in civil cases dating back to the 1990's for false representations, working without a license etc. He presented a license to me that had expired in 2019 and explained that the county is behind in reissuing license due to covid which I know is false. It would appear that the recent conviction was in 2019 which might explain why he may not have a license.

There also appear to be a restitution judgement of 15K etc. I am quite taken back by this because it is so easy to be duped in this business and not all states have such an open access policy. I have gone back to him and asked whether he would do the work up front in stages and if the work is independently verifiable then I can release the payment (just to see his response). 

Do others run any background checks or carry other sort of DD to avoid fraud etc.