Quickly Estimate Repair Costs

[Andrew Flower]

When you have found a potential deal and you are getting ready to make an offer, part of the calculation for that offer has to include the necessary repairs to either bring that property to its potential retail value or make it tenant ready.  I understand that bringing a contractor in to provide an estimate for these repairs would give you a good idea, but this could also be time consuming and would require estimates for several different properties to get good data.  Then there is the fact that material and labor costs fluctuate fairly significantly at times which would change these numbers.  This brings me to the question, how do you "ballpark" the repair costs for a flip and for a rental so that the turnaround on an offer is faster?  And because there are different figures in every market, I would appreciate some Hoosiers from central Indiana giving some insight.

Thanks!

Andy