What is having a General Contractor like?

[Paul Garcia]

Hi All. 

When it comes to real estate I consider myself a hard nosed investor. Always getting involved with the nitty gritty and just pushing through (never pretty). When renovating this results in myself acting as the general contractor. I'm currently mid-way though a renovation where I'm adding a floor to a brick building. The other day something struck me and made me question my practices. A few buildings down a property was demolished, foundation built, and 3 stories of the brick exterior finished before I was done with the one floor! 

I hire and oversee the demo guys, hvac, plumbing, electrical, drywall, paint, floors, etc. Although this helps significantly lower my costs, the added time and stress is starting to weigh on me. I have a full-time job outside of real estate. 

For my next project I'm thinking about hiring an experienced general contractor.  

What is it like hiring a big time GC for your project? 

Are you on site everyday?

Making good old Home Depot runs regularly?

Meeting and calling different tradesmen? 

Noticeable increase in costs?

Whats the GC experience vs doing it yourself?

Thanks!

[Antoine Martel]

Hiring a big time GC makes it so you can be hands off and handle multiple projects at one time.

They'll be able to handle everything for you.

You do not need to go to site everyday. 

You can make the GC do those runs for you or you can do them to help out and save time and costs.

They'll handle all the tradesmen.

Of course for this you'll pay a premium :) 

I love the GC experience. You can now do 10 projects at one time instead of one.