A week later my window was smashed out the blue.

Providing a generic scope of work to a smart contractor will never save you money.Now, providing a generic scope of work to a bad contractor may save you money, at least until he realizes all the things that his bid didn't include and he walks off the job.Also, if you're not specific in your scope of work, what's to stop the contractor from using the ugly countertops that were on sale or the pink and blue cabinets that he purchased used off of Craigslist?

Harrisburg is similar to Trenton in that it relies upon the state bureacracy to provide stable long term jobs, government work is the city's economic lifeline.Transport hubs also provide a fair living for blue collar folk.  

Leveled house- exterior paint, fresh landscaping, added privacy fence, interior paint, new windows, new mini split heat pump system, painted kitchen cabinets, new counters and hardware, new bathroom vanities and toilets, expoxied baby blue bathtub and tile surround white.

If you want to raise capital from investors you also need to be compliant with the SEC and state blue sky laws.

You made a great point, even with blue prints in my experience, even with crazy due diligence, shooting the worst case scenario (I would say, I am a top tier professional when it comes to estimating a job) - it always cost waaay more than it should have, and took waaay longer than it should.

You can rent a "U Sand" machine from Home Depot and you really can't mess it up (unlike a belt sander, this is lighter grade and uses 4 orbiting sanding disks).

It’s an affluent area with blue ribbon schools in a great location within walking distance to town and the train station into Center City Philadelphia as well as the suburbs.

We mostly use 2 colors of paint, a beige and a grey that also looks blue when the light hits it right so tenants feel like they get two different room colors and tend to really like that.

Seen some minor ups and downs but my area is very blue collar and the recession proved to be a small blip and not catastrophic like some other areas.