.- Most contractors will cut corners, or worse, once they figure out they won't be watched closely:( Your job will also go to the bottom of their priority list.Monitoring progress is relatively easy: hire that same inspector to go by weekly or before any payments to take a VIDEO of:1) What was done2) Quality of workmanshipOne other thing you didn't ask about, payments to contractors.- They all want 50% down or as much as they can squeeze out of you. 

A Cut Above lawn and landscape out of Andover is run by my partner Andrew.

Congrats on having the cajones to cut the chord.  

As for funding, hard money can cut into profits, but it’s useful for scaling quickly.

When 2008 -2009 hit we were forced to cut our quarterly payouts to reflect the problem loans.  

This contract includes an exclusivity clause to prevent your clients from bypassing you and going straight to the lenders to cut out your commission. 

It looks to be heavily treed.Have you thought about having a timber consultant tell you if theres any value in having someone come in and cut down the timber? 

I cut off PMs that constantly try to find ways to add revenues by what I call trickery; selling some 3rd party service that they have contracted to all their clients, recommending small fixes turn into large one's,etc, make it difficult to get 2nd opinions. 

You will thank yourself it cuts down the calls by 90% in my experience. 

In other words, if you don't fill your unit in the slow season because you're afraid it will cut into your high season revenue, will the high season revenue more than cover the difference?