It must be worth for enough owners, I used to see a group of illegals congregating in the home depot waiting to be hired. 

@Nathan Killebrew“Id rather be a warrior in a garden than a Gardner in a war”.

Loan Depot. 

Why not try stopping by a local garden center & asking what they would recommend & get prices (unless you don't have these in Texas & people go to Home Depot?)

They were upset at the thought of a year of construction and losing the view of greenspace/gardens on my lot.   

I've considered the Cap-a-tread option at Home Depot but it seems way too pricey. 

There arent that many charges.My issue is that we do a lot of work when we bring the properties online, and I don't want to manually import 100 transactions from home depot manually. 

I think my first purchase will use an FHA loan (or some variant thereof) to buy a quadruplex in the central gardens area, but that is only my current line of thought and I'll try and be flexible if another opportunity presents itself.Anyways, that's me in a nutshell.

I use a lot of vinyl plank flooring ( Alure from Home Depot) but it is not as stout as tile, however a good second choice.

In regards to finding contractors, there are many options to use to get names of contractors:Angies ListHome AdvisorYellow PagesEven Home Depot now has a referral website....can't remember the name.All of them are feasible ways to find contractors.