Out of area and estimating repairs

[Sean Dezoysa]

Hi everyone;

I wanted to ask about repair estimates. Do you pay an agent, appraiser, or partner wholesaler to walk every property and build your estimates, or do you ballpark them?

Aaron Mazzrillo (who has done a BP podcast) ballparks all of his at $20/sf estimated repairs. He said in So Cal it's done very well for him despite being so basic. He does buy quite low (something like 52% ARV, in So Cal) so maybe some thin deals are also filtering out this way.

I've also heard you can just ask the seller for what needs fixing and ballpark the rehab as light/medium/heavy. A paint and sweep is around $3,000 to 5,000 in repairs. A moderate rehab is $10k to $15k. A big rehab is 25k to $40k. 

Curious what everyone else is doing when they don't or can't walk the homes themselves.