Our homes include Energy Star Ratings, Energy Star Stainless Steel Appliances, Granite, Hardwoods, Basic W/W Carpet, Marble Vanity Tops, Full Tiled Shower Stalls or Tubs, Moen Faucets, Level 4 Finish on the Drywall, 1 Color Paint, Standard 3.25 Trim, 2 Panel Doors, Bronze Hardware, Manuel Garage Doors, Architectual Shingled Roof w/ Vinyl Siding and Stone Knee Wall, Comfort Maker HVAC System and Bradford White Water Heaters with Pex Manifolds, 1 Standard Sump Pump.Note: Keep in mind we are building 2,500+ sqft homes.

.#4 Contact Local Contractors For PricingCall local Subcontractors and get budget pricing for common repairs on your typical rehab project.For example, call a roofer and ask what their average cost per Square of Architectural Asphalt Shingle Roofing would be on a 1,500 sf house, with a 6/12 pitch.#5 Build Out Your Database in a Spreadsheet or Estimating SoftwareOnce you start to get a better understanding of Labor and Material costs you will want to store this data into a spreadsheet or software that you can use to help you streamline the estimating process.#6 Practice, Practice, PracticeWalk through distressed fixer-upper properties (or find properties virtually online) and practice creating detailed scopes of work, quantifying repairs and estimating rehab costs for the projects.This will help you get acquainted with common rehab repairs, rehab costs & estimating terminology.#7 Get Your First Rehab Project!

The house had a brand new HVAC system, new water heater, and serviceable laminate floors in most of the rooms, and new electrical wiring & plumbing, but needed new kitchen cabinets, a dishwasher, a new bathroom and had a 90 year old tin shingle roof.

Under the new tangible property regulations I would expense the roof if the new roofing material was similar to the old roofing material (example asphalt shingle to asphalt shingle) (unless the roof was already in a state of disrepair when you acquired the property and it has not deteriorated to a complete state of disrepair.

Some background: I have been looking at a duplex in north Florida that would be my first venture into REI, I have never owned real estate before so my experience has been reading, more reading, the podcast, and talking to non-investors that are long-time home owners.The property claims to have a "10-yr old roof" - but after looking at the property, it appears they just put an additional layer of (asphalt) shingles on top of the ones that were already on there. 

Handyman went over and checked things out - roof was shingled and shouldn't have been because of the narrow slope over the back porch and bathroom.

The roof was shot, it had a large hole near the chimney and most of the shingles had curled up and fell off.

Hi Sherry, I'm in BC where we have a lot of wood shakes and shingles, and I own a couple of properties with wood siding.

You might expect a shingled roof to last ~25 years because the shingle might be rated/warrantied for that period of time, BUT if you monitor and do repairs as they come up it can very well last 30, 35, or even 40 years which to many people sounds crazy but since roofs are expensive those extra years are like gold!

But floor, shingle, anything removal is a pita and it costs money.