Originally posted by @Matthew Berry:A few tools I'm familiar with:J Scott's The Book on Estimating Rehab Costs, which has a fantastic 8 page matrix of per unit costs and labor estimates.HouseFlippingSpreadsheet.com offers what seems to be a robust rehab estimator along with other tools, all bundled up in an Excel spreadsheet for $100-300.Those are the two resources I recommend (though I'm probably biased on the book) -- the book for learning the methodology and the software for putting together budgets for specific projects...J Scott's guide is based on his location and negotiated rates with his preferred contractors.

Just curious what everyones methodologies are to finding vacancy rate, avg rent rates and so on.Thanks in advance!  

@Holden Mitchell I think I see your methodology.   

After much deliberation, I believe that buy and hold investing is the methodology that most meets my goals and ‘why’ statement.

It is simply a way to pay them if I am not managing their hours, allow them to control the "journey to the destination" such as methodology to deliver work, no uniform, allow them to work for other people, not providing training, etc. 

My question is if you have a 'study' done on one unit, can you also apply that 'methodology' to your similar/identical units also?

My thinking is you would need to know the ARV to know if it's a worthwhile investment or not.This methodology would also be used for wholesaling correct?

., While we are in Northern VA the methodology should remain fairly the same.

I do not agree with that methodology so they are always overpriced to me.You made a good point about permits.  

And as I say in the book, you'll never be able to learn without actually talking to contractors and finding out what your local prices are for the types of contractors (and the types of work) you want to do.There are methodologies that can make the process very clear and simple...but there are no shortcuts to actually getting the information.