PATRIOT BUILDERS - Southeastern Michigan and Mid-Michigan.Experienced in Flipping - General Contractor - All Trades on Staff:  Framers, Drywall, Interior Trim, Ceramic Tile/Flooring and more.  1 crew dedicated to your investment from start to finish.I purchased a home at auction last week for $17k, it has an approx value of $30k-$35k..... 

Our work consisted mainly of repainting the whole place, inside and out, which included replacing a fair amount of the trim boards on the exterior, installing new copper gutters and flashings, a few minor repairs to the slate roof (no leaks), a new driveway and garage floor, new garage flat rubber roof, renovating 2 full bathrooms that we used a lot of pretty expensive tile in, all floors except the sunroom had hardwood floors that were sanded and refinished, the sunroom had a travertine floor installed.

Some things were never finished like it needs trim. 

It's just permits and mold and drywall, flooring, cabinets, appliances, doors, trim and paint. 

And really the filters need to be changed closer to monthly  in hopes of getting the tenants to change as much as needed.As far as the yard - I would say at least once a year the bushes and trees should be trimmed, the gutters cleaned out and over all the yard looked at - your tenant is probably not going to do this, despite it being something they should be doing according to their lease.  

Just try putting together an estimate of the materials, tile, flooring, sinks, appliances, plumbing, drywall,tape mud etc. paint, driveway, electrical fixtures, locks, trim, faucets, cabinets, vanity, toilet,shower head, light bulbs,doors ,Knobs, countertops, landscaping...I suspect just in materials you will be close to 40k...do you need to replace windows?

New roof: $5,000 New siding: $2,500 New drywall: $7,000 New plumbing: $2,000 New elec: $3,500 New flooring: $2,000 Painting: $800 Cabinets: $1,500 Fixtures: $2,000 Appliances: $3,000 Total: $29,300 Don't forget other possible expenditures...we have to do most of these things on most of our rehab houses:- HVAC (could easily run $3K)- Framing (if there is termite or structural damage)- Mold Remediation (could easily run $5-10K)- Doors (could easily run $1-2K)- Windows (could easily run $3-6K)- Bathroom vanities- Showers/Tubs- Subfloor/Trim- Main Plumbing Line Replacement- Outlets, Switches, Registers, Smoke Alarms, etc- Gutters- Soffit/Fascia- Garage Doors/Openers- Termite Treatments- Decks/Porches- Landscaping/Grading- Garage Doors- Chimney Repair/Chimney CapThat stuff could easily run another $30K...I live in a major metropolitan area (Atlanta), and generally spend about $30/sq ft for a lower-end gut rehab, and with typical houses around here of about 2000 sq ft, my typical gut rehab runs about $60K.So, if this house is in anything by a low-end neighborhood and in a typical location in terms of cost, $70-80K is probably pretty accurate for a ground-up rehab.

Clearly an ad at the end.How about the story remains but the add is trimmed?

Sometimes it’s only around the trim areas and it would make sense to replace the trim but that is usually not the case. 

We replaced the roof, all flooring, bathroom vanities, fixtures, trim, painted kitchen cabinets and moved them around, hardware, toilets, half the siding, tons of yard work and cutting out weeds the size of trees, new paint inside and out, built a wood plank wall and made a faux beam in the master bathroom out of a poorly designed wall that was hanging down.