All Forum Posts by: Manolo D.

Common sense prevails, not really a law. Judge will simply decide in favor of landlord. I mean, really, over a couple bucks?

@Jerry Murphy If they are minor corrections, your contractor should have a red ink and just sign it off from there. 6 weeks is... too much. I've done it in less than a week and first was simply to get all the corrections, comply them and be done.

@Kevin Dehesa Wow, I say again, Wow, with a capital W. There's no risk in land, I mean, what could go wrong, it is ---- land. All public utilities are important, unless you want to start living off grid.  You will need a zoning approved by the city to build a modular home, maybe residential zoning.  That's all the information I have for you unless you have more questions.

@Disia Page Who said 20% is the requirement?

Why? There’s a thread for remodeling diaries.

Ken Truong Either you pay the price or shoulder the headache. Handyman - I use them and pay them by the hour but I tell them what to do and what the outcome I want then again, I’m a contractor. My rule is, if they haven’t spent at least a year’s worth in that trade, don’t get them to do it. In an investors perspective, I won’t use them to do anything above 2k. Permit pulling and operating legally is one of the most common differences. You can’t hire a handyman over $500 (on all work - labor and material) without a license or a 1099, if something goes wrong, you lose the 15k contractors bond leverage (your safety net) as well which you could chase if this GC fails to perform the contract. The price difference is what you pay not as an additional profit for GCs but the real cost of doing business, we pay employer taxes, workers comp, and operating expenses. Taxes and Work Comp alone will be around 35-50% from whatever we pay to our workers. Also, if your handyman gets injured on your jobsite, he can sue you and your brand new house, I mean, I would, I know you have equity in there.

Tae C. I won’t be reading everyone’s responses, but here is my take. 1. Code Enforcement is a different department from Builrand Safety as you know. 2. Take the pulled permits and drawings to the Code Enforcer to tick off all their violations that cross your remodel. MAYBE they will want to skip some of those and accept B&S sign off instead of having two inspections CE and BS, totally up to them. 3. Remodel for months......not really an option. Next time, put $xxx - Approved permit. on your contract, that should be their first payment (if you don’t pay deposit, if you do, then that should be a pre-requisite).

Kareem Arnold Don’t expect anything close to top dollar, you are operating under a scenario of illegal operations, so you need to lower all your figures and levels of expectation when it comes to “standard” programs, your building is not anywhere close to “standard”. Put it this way, if you have 3/1 permitted plus an unpermitted room (den), then you convert it to 2/2 plus the master bedroom (den), in reality, the only legal rooms is now a 2/1 (you lose 1 permitted bedroom that you turned to bath). So worse case scenario, during appraisal or during selling, the buyer/appraiser will price it to either pull the permits and it’s necessary repairs, or price it to convert it back to a 3/1. Either way you lose by not pulling permit. 2 months is too much, I pulled one in 2 weeks it’s only 2,500-3,500 out the door if i charged fees (permit itself was less than 1k). There are quick/over the counter permits that you could pull same day.

Omar Matthew Belove Are sure your lender will approve you based on 1099? Most wont because it’s not a day job, it’s self employment. Also, can you really cash flow those figures on HML + Gap? Or will your lender be ok when they all have the risk and you could simply walk away?

Originally posted by @Brady Lamprecht:

Well, I finally received a very detailed SOW from A contractor (not the one I was referring to originally) and am going to pay him for his work.  I've run the numbers on the deal that I currently investigating and now am crossing my 'T's and dotting my 'I's and about to put an offer in.

The question I have now is, during the due diligence time between going under contract and the actual closing taking place, should I hire an inspector to do essentially the same thing as this contractor has done or not?  I've seen what inspectors do from the purchase of my primary residence 5 years ago and I can't honestly tell a difference between that report and what my contractor just provided.

@Cara Lonsdale From your profile page, you seem to have a lot of experience under your belt in this area so I'm wondering what your opinion is.  I know that the report created for my primary residence had disclaimers that I couldn't come back sue for items he might have overlooked so while the additional cost isn't a lot in the long run, I don't know what the added benefit would be.

 The only difference between a very detailed SOW and an inspection is the inspection report will reflect that a unit (i.e. water heater) will have the lifespan (8 out of 10) and other similar suggestions.