$300 for a class with a good local guy could be a sensible use of your time/money, IMO, especially if he is sharing contacts of some of his local suppliers.

Right now I work as a temp for an auto supplier.

We are here in Dunedin, NZ and are fighting with the final 5 towns and cities in a contest for our national supplier of broadband to introduce a first Gigatown in NZ.

I'm a solar contractor and you can get equipment at good prices direct from websites and suppliers like renvu.com or civicsolar.com.

Most suppliers want to see a contractors license in order to give contractor pricing.

Get replacements for the damaged ones, and next time find a local cabinet supplier that gets them into their warehouse in "knock down" (in assembled in flat packaging) form, and where you get plywood sides and bottoms. 

You will want to do a little research on the suppliers to make sure you do not get a cheap knock off which will deteriorate quickly from UV .... otherwise, you will be repainting sooner than you would like.The only downside is they make large canvases for wayward youth with rattle cans.Now, if you are into dayglo orange or yellow, snow fence is pretty cheap ... we just unrolled 1500' of it a couple of weeks ago ... total cost w/ posts <$1200 ;)

That construction agreement may not be valid without a license.Forget any construction financing, you can't give the property as collateral.If suppliers extend credit for materials, they will generally want the address and owner to sign or a licensed contractor with a valid construction agreement allowing liens to be created.You can file your option and cloud title, but that cloud doesn't prevent an owner from selling the property subject to that option, the new owner will be obligated to sell it under the option, but if you fail to exercise it as agreed, they will own the place.

As you complete more houses and gain experience you will learn more about what to look for in cost savings and can "fine tune" them by using repeat suppliers and contractors like Bob above is correctly suggesting in order to maximize your savings. 

What suppliers do other investors in the Chicagoland area use, specifically for granite and kitchen cabinets?