I've spent a few hours reading a lot of your posts and other material online and I still have a few questions.1 - Who is the trustee of the land trust?

I am very grateful for any help in the matterGet the owner to put you on title.Put a lien on title for the cost of your time and materials in case he gets squirrely. 

Be careful about it - especially if the contractor is buying materials.

Were I to walk into a house and see extensive dark wood stain used on obvious new Select grade oak, I'd casually shrug off the owner as an ignoramus with little understanding or appreciation of honest yet magnificent North American oak as a residential building or finishing material.

Specific colors, flooring, ceiling materials etc... that you may have to put back to period specific after renovation. 

The rub is no one knows when an adverse cycle will materialize, nor what it's impact will be. 

That way, new material cannot be added later.A quitclaim deed that contains certain magic words such as "fee simple" buried down at the bottom in stuff you consider boilerplate, or other legalese you don't think is important, might transform your quitclaim deed into a full warranty deed.

That way, new material cannot be added later.A quitclaim deed that contains certain magic words such as "fee simple" buried down at the bottom in stuff you consider boilerplate, or other legalese you don't think is important, might transform your quitclaim deed into a full warranty deed.

But if you're hiring strangers to do the work including managing the project, with the rising cost of materials, involving the city, and contractors generally being in high demand right now, I'd be surprised if you were able to make a lot of (or any really) money on the project right now.

I am building a home and have a flooring and tile contractor, I have paid for all the materials up from 32k , tile people hired by floor tile company have worked 4 days and have about another week to complete job, contractor ( flooring company)is requesting we pay them 1/2 of the labor now and rest when job complete , we do not feel comfortable doing this because job is so short, we think only fair to pay them full price off labor when job complete, does this sound normal