How to grow my remodeling business

Question

I’ve recently relocated my family/business to Washington State. Im busy and turning work away on a daily basis which is now starting to frustrate me. I’m looking for a mentor that can advise and guide me in the right direction.

Craig Tripp · Answer

Must read books:

“Profit First” by Mike Michalowicz

He actually has several books that I would recommend for any contractor / small business owner.

“Markup & Profit” by Michael Stone.

Geared toward the contractor / remodeler and is a fantastic read

Bryan Devitt · Answer

It is going to take some time, but build a sub base. Just sub one or two things at a time until you find subs you can rely on and then you can slowly sub more and more until you sub everything. We turn work down every day but has more to do with it not being the type of work we want to do. If we like the job then we will bid it and that gets a lot more off the table because we're not the cheapest by a mile (we do higher end renos with a lot of attention to detail and custom work). If you get to the point where you're not turning work down, then you're doing it wrong IMO. 20% of the work usually makes 80% of the money, so turn down 80% of the crappy work and crappy clients (most important part) and you can work almost normal hours with a lot less stress and very little drop in cash flow

Matthew Paul · Answer

A lot of VERY great advice .    Stay small , Keep it all . It isnt how much you make , its how much you keep .

Tim Johnson · Answer

I'm a GC now but I started out as a sub and doing my own work.  Its a huge step to go from doing the work to GC the work.  If you call yourself a perfectionist get ready to be very disappointed. It took me about 2 years to get over the fact that nothing is going to be perfect.

To be honest, the first couple years GC is going to be hard, you might lose money.  Mainly because you don't know how to bid using subs.  It seems all simple, to just get the subs to bid the job and then submit the bid, but a lot of the times when its time to use that sub they are booked or they are a candle in wind.  Then you have to find another one and you have to pay more, and depending on your contract you can't just simple pass on the costs.  Being a GC is hard work and stressful work, get ready to over pay people and pay a ton of people before you are paid.

I'm actually just doing my own work now, doing specs and my own projects, I don't really even take on new clients just because I was sick and tired of the headaches that come from GC.  If you ever want to have a chat about it, feel free to send me a PM and I will send you my phone number.

Account Closed · Answer

I believe that there is a REIA that meets in Bellevue. That would be a good source of contacts for you.

Manolo D. · Answer

@Richard Wedlake Stay at a medium pace of growth. The easiest way to maintain what I was used to and quality, was hiring employees. I don’t have to deal with other people’s schedules. I might be like you who want certain things done, on a certain way, within a certain time. Only employees have that flexibility. There’s multiple forms of GC, I am a self performing GC with employees, others simply are project/contract managers who calls themselves GCs. Pretty easy to grow this way than that of maintaining subs who can always bail where the grass is greener.

Lori Greene · Answer

If you don't have enough time to do remodeling then you won't have time to flip houses. Why not do the least time consuming strategy: Wholesaling?

You want to start by putting out an I Buy Houses ad (only use unique wording so you stand out from other investor ads). Then people call you. That way you don't have to spend any time finding deals.

When they call, you spend 5 or 10 minutes asking questions about the property, their situation (motivation), their loan status and equity.

Then you make them an offer. If they accept your offer, you sell the contract to another investor for a fee, which you can do in several ways:

• Assign the Contract
• Make the Offer in the name of a Disposable LLC and sell them the LLC.
• Do a Double Close using Transactional Funding

Here is a link to another post here on BiggerPockets that talks all about how to find cash buyers to wholesale your deals to: https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/93/topics/674...

It's in a thread where my post is about 7 answers down from the top.

And here's an article in the Innovative Strategies section of BiggerPockets that talks all about what kind of ad to put out to attract motivated sellers and what kind of offers to make to get the most offers accepted: https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/61/topics/635...

I realized that at the beginning of this article, I forgot to say exactly what the ad I referred to was supposed to say. And BiggerPockets won't let me edit it or post another article with the correct info.

So here's what the ad is supposed to say: "I Will Buy Your House for Full Market Value minus Repairs."

Once you know that, the article will make more sense.

If you have questions about any of these strategies, I'd be happy to answer them.

Enjoy.

Richard Wedlake · Answer

@Matthew Paul

I really appreciate all this great advice, it’s definitely reinforcing my gut feeling.

What’s your thoughts on flipping houses and the market right now.

Richard Wedlake · Answer

@Matthew Paul

Thanks Paul that’s great advise and think I’m pretty competitive with the market.

I guess what I meant to say was I’m turning potential customers down before I’ve even provided an estimate due to my current work load. I’ve been advised to consider being more of a general contractor managing subs instead of trying to do it all myself. I am a perfectionist though and managing other companies to work for my company stresses me out but something needs to change.

I’m also considering flipping houses depending on the market?

I may of forgotten to mention I also have 3 kids under the age 3 so I ain’t just busy with work.

How to grow my remodeling business

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