How to Find Great Contractors

you're about to discover how to find great contractors and hopefully in this short video I can condense for you a lifetime of experience so you can eliminate one of the most frustrating parts of real estate which is dealing with bad contractors because unfortunately there are bad people in every profession right there are bad attorneys there are bad doctors bad pastors and there seems to be a predominantly high percentage of bad contractors - but they're not all bad there is a silver lining here the story does have a happy ending there are some amazing there are some great contractors out there and I'm hoping to share with you how you can find those people and work with them because they can make all the difference in the world now you may have already watched a previous video on the subject of contractors that are recently put out called 7 things to never say to a contractor if you haven't seen that video click on here and make sure you watch it in a way it's kind of a prerequisite for this one now if you are a contractor and you watched our previous video a lot of y'all were very offended I saw it in the comments well you're gonna love this video because now all of a sudden you're going to be cheering me on and what I share and how the customer which is us is the investor they need to have their act together and there's so much more to hiring a great contractor beyond simply find it so you're gonna discover that as well I'm Phil poo ste offski by the way with freedom intercom I'm a full time real estate investor real estate mentor and coach to many of those successful real estate investors all across North America best-selling author my first book how to be a real estate investor which I give away for free top right corner it's been a best-seller for many years and then my second book real estate investing gone bad this tells you what not to do amazing lessons in here but most importantly this is the number one YouTube channel on real estate investing in the world and the reason is because I share with you truth signal wisdom that you'll hear nowhere else and great contractors do exist they are rare but they are there and I want to share with you how you can find them and that starts with you being the right customer for a great contractor interesting huh I'm gonna focus on you for a moment because great contractor are in the minority and so they can choose their customers and they do choose their customers they don't put up with people that are gonna be a pain in the butt and they want to work on the jobs that fit their skill set and they're going to be picky and so if you want the best you need to be the best and so I'm going to describe you three ways in which you can be the best so you can attract the right kinds of contractors let's get started number one you need to know the job you need to understand what the job entails so you can tailor the right kind of contractor to the job I'm going to give you a simple example would be plumbing if you have a clog in a drainpipe you may not need some high-powered licensed plumber that does massive commercial jobs you could use someone who's not even a licensed plumber to clear out that drain but what if you want to plan an entirely new plumbing system now you need a specialized licensed plumber that does that kind of thing each different kind of contractor has their own set of skills so you need to understand what your job is so you can fit the job to the contractor otherwise what happens is either you have underkill or overkill either you have someone not qualified for the job or someone who's overqualified you need someone who's ideally right in the qualified zone and so if you're just getting started in real estate this right here is a tough situation for you this is why I'm a mentor that's why I teach and mentor others so they can get up to speed so they can be in the position where they can get the best deals they can hire the best contractors they can actually do this business right and make good money so you need to understand what you're up against and I'm not a big fan of over killing or over hiring either I think you need to make sure you fit the right contractor so when I talk about the word great I think we need to help define what that means great is not necessarily a big company or a small company or a medium-sized company it's fitting the right company to the job and rate can be in all levels now I personally prefer working with smaller outfits where the owner is actually doing some of the work and they might be overseeing some additional people underneath them on their team I don't like going with the big big companies where they send out entire teams they have their own estimator in their own you know back off his team that's a little bit too much overhead for me but there are benefits to those kind of contracting operations as well I'm not saying don't work with them so that just happens to be one of my personal preferences what great is to me is someone who's darn good at their role so another example would be this let's say for example you need to get a new panel change for an electrical work and you need to get it done without pulling permits now not all electricians are going to do that but so might and they might still be great they might be willing to kind of bend the rules and go ahead and replace that panel about having to pull permits so greatest relative and I think that's the key lesson there it's relative to the job it's relative to the task but the key is you know your job right that way you can fit the right the right group into that particular job now if you don't know the exact way to solve the problem that's okay when you call up the contracting team to be able to go get a bid you can explain what you understand and what you don't okay I know this is going wrong but I don't really know how to solve it that's fine that can be their role that's why they get paid the big bucks as the contractor to make sure that they can fix that role on that problem but at least you know what the problem is because if you're completely clueless a great contractor is gonna is gonna move the other way they don't want to put up with that kind of confusion they want to work with clear concise people that have their act together okay number two maybe should've been number one fast pay write this down fast pay makes for good friends fast pay makes for good friends when you pay quickly you you open up your opportunities to work with all kinds of great contractors recently I had a big job and some of my other people were on it on a previous job they're still finishing up and I need to get things moving and so I reached out to one of the guys that I work with quite a bit and I said hey do you have any recommendations we'll talk a little bit more about combination of their contractors on somebody to do this electrical work for me and I said yeah I got a guy that a good friend of mine he's been working for a big company for 15 years just went out on his own give him a call get the guy call he says yeah you uh you know Jeremy recommended you Phil he says that the you that you're good got to work with I said oh really what did Jeremy say about me he started laughing he says you're the fastest payer of anybody he's ever worked with you he says you pay his invoice the day he sends it literally every single time he's never seen anything like in his entire business life boo fast pay makes for good friends when you pay fast you make contractors happy now again you have to structure your contracts which goes back to that seven things you never say to a contractor video to make sure you're paying at the right time of the job and you're not paying too ahead of time but when you do get the invoice when you do have to pay pay quickly also by the way I always pay um I'm gonna say cash but I always pay in the form of a check or a wire I don't pay with credit cards with contractors because that extra three percent makes a big deal with them now I do pay credit cards and I'm buying it from suppliers you know your Home Depot's and your and your lows and that sort of thing but if I'm paying the contractor I don't go the credit card route even if they take credit cards because they appreciate that extra two to three percent let me tell you all right so if you know the job and you can pay fast by the what else to meet you have to pay upfront also means you need to have money too a lot of investors give us a bad name out there to two great contractors to they don't pay their contracts to do any money don't hire the contractor you don't have the money don't do it don't buy the property if you have enough money to pay the contractors necessary to get the job done right I have other videos on that subject as well do it right or don't do it at all okay so if you know the job you you are paying quickly here's the next thing you need to be clear in your communications this is all the way from the beginning all the way to the very end of the job they nobody likes to work with a boss that is confused because then they don't know what a good job looks like and I'll tell you this great contractors they're not always the ones that charge the most money but great contractors have a pride they can beat their chests and say I did that job right they have a pride about doing it right and so they don't know what right is if you don't clearly communicate what it needs to be accomplished so if you're confused you have a problem hiring great people and that's what also happens as well well contractors will do is they will price a job higher because they think you're going to be a confused pain in the butt in contractors you know what I'm talking about like oh yeah this person won't change their mind three times and they're going to complain they want you to to clearly communicate what your expectations are so that either a they meet the expectations great ones usually exceed the expectations and then here's a big one you need to take responsibility okay take responsibility when you screw up when you communicate incorrectly when you ask them to do something that ends up being incorrect or looks stupid you raise your hand you're off that's my bad because when you do that they'll do the same thing back when they make a mistake they'll say Phil I apologize man I couldn't get to the job yesterday I know I promised I'd get that done I know that's gonna literally throw off the entire schedule what the additional contractors coming in I'm so sorry I'm gonna get in there early tomorrow morning I'm gonna get it done I promise but they're not gonna act that way if you act like the kind of person that says well I didn't say that oh you know you're it's your job you're you know you're the HVAC guy you're supposed to know all this stuff not me you need to take responsibility when you make a mistake you need to be clear on what your expectations are and when there are changes you need to be clear on what those changes are you need to communicate that in such a way where there's no way there's any confusion this is all about being a good boss being a good manager being a good businessperson and if you don't do this right you might get the first job with that great contractor but you'll never get a second one because they won't put up with the crap they want you to be a good customer too then won't you be a great customer and that means being clear in your communications and you can tell I'm clear of my communications there are misunderstandings there are mistakes usually it's my fault usually I bought the raw materials I still make those mistakes but wait I always laugh by say hey it's my fault hey I'll pay a little extra for the extra work you got to do and so you you played that role and you will get the best from the best people because if you've ever been a coach you know what I'm talking about coach and Little League and whatnot great people want to work with other great people if you've got this ace of a picture on your team and the rest of your team sucks let me tell you that picture is gonna go off into some you know intramural League that's different from the public league they're gonna go do something different because they don't they want to work with a team that's awesome too and we're going to coach that's awesome you want to be the kind of person that they want to work with and I have drilled this home you get it now so let's talk about the next thing which is how do you find the great contractors so you can do all this fun stuff now that you have your act together now you can go out and start collecting some names and some grant contractors to talk to now I use the phrase collecting some names because as you know my rule is always get three bids now if you get to a point where you're doing a ton of deals you're doing six 10 15 30 renovations a year you may have your team right and so you may not have to get bids from some of them but you may have to get them from new ones that you that you bring in for the first time so let's just assume at this point you're like most real estate investors that I'll ever watch this video you're not doing 13 deals a year at this point rehabs you're doing maybe zero okay so at this point what you need to do next is you need to start collecting names and you need to do it in places where you have the highest probability of connecting with someone who might be great so the first place ends up being somewhat of a blessing these days and that's you got your Angie's List and you've got your home advisor now not all great contractors are on these lists so don't think because they're not on here that there's somehow not good because there's some great ones out there that don't fiddle with these two because they're too busy doing jobs to be in the world of marketing but one of the nice things about it of course is you get to see the reviews but you got to take some that with a grain of salt because sometimes a great contractor works with a bad customer or a series of bad customers and they give these awful reviews when those the customers fall because they weren't clear in their communications or they didn't pay them quickly or whatever the case may be so but it's a good place to start collecting some names especially when you're dealing with specific trade electrician plumber HVAC roofie it's a great place to start all right another place to collect names and I would argue is my favorite is what I'm gonna say a recommendation sawdust to re see from other great contractors all right now this is a bit of a change right so I've gone from you know you've got kind of going out into the world looking yourself to going within the realm of other great contractors birds of a feather flock together and great contractors no other great contractors and let me tell you why because they've been on the jobsite together they've seen what these people do work wise they've seen the speed of their work they've seen the way they talk the way they operate the way they deal with their employees other great contractors so let's say you're calling up some names on Angie's List and let's say they say over we're booked for the next three months okay well do you who would you recommend if it was your house who would you recommend get the job done now that I've described to you what that job is remember go after that know what your job is so if you know what the job is you can describe it over a phone if you're clearing communications they might say to you oh I'll tell you you should work with go work with Rick here's his phone number he's awesome now he may be booked to I don't know his schedule but he's awesome - so other great contractors is one of the best ways to find great contractors but maybe you you you still haven't got there yet right so you tried that one of the places I like to see again this isn't the word recommendation or you see this is going to be suppliers so this is anywhere from your Sherwin Williams your Ferguson plumbing fixtures all the way to even Home Depot or Lowe's in fact some people I've told them just literally camp out in front of the contractor services desk at Home Depot for a day and every contractor that comes through say hello talk to them and talk to the people that work at Home Depot and ask who they like the most because so often when I work with great contractors if I'm in there with the mind some materials I have discovered that those people that work at the Home Depot and Lowe's and other suppliers in the world will say to me Oh Phil I just love this guy he's been coming in here for five straight years faithful customer I just love working with this guy so other suppliers can be a great place to get names and again we're collecting names at this point because you want to get three of each in any any particular job or task now number four on this list this one was a bit interesting it could work really well and you can see I had that little bit of a devilish smile I'm gonna call it driving around but another way to call it would be poaching so if you know an area is is getting a lot of rehab work you could drive around and look for any houses that have big dumpsters or where you know work is going on and you can go check it out and maybe go talk to that contract that's doing the work or whoever is doing the work because a lot of times some of these contractors will sub out the actual work for the actual workers and that's who you want to connect with with the direct workers so you should go there though not unlike them Monday at 11:00 when everybody's at work I like my favorite time is a Friday at about 5:00 p.m. if they're still on the job site 5:00 p.m. on a Friday they're already way up on my book that is a huge sign of strength because usually they're chopping off by one o'clock most lazy contractors but the good ones are still there at 5 o'clock trying to finish some stuff up so they have the whole weekend themselves so that right there can work in another little tip on driving around especially if you know you're poaching and you know some other investor that's their crew send a woman to go go say hello because if you walk up as a dude they're gonna be a little bit more standoffish if a woman work walks up and say I'll excuse me um I have this little house I'm looking to rehab oh it works it works well so this one this one could be absolutely fantastic but just be aware you might take some people off if you poach for me one of your competitors alright number five moving right along somewhat like this this would be you can get recommendations from other real estate professionals it can sometimes work I mean real estate agents probably more than investors good investors usually don't want to share they're good people they usually only want to share they're bad people they'll say oh yeah this roofer is great when he's really terrible just because they're a competitor I know most people wouldn't do that but you gotta be aware that it does happen whereas real estate agents say they may not be as tied to the outcome and they might actually recommend some good people problem with this is this is kind of a blind leading the blind sometimes doesn't work out as well sometimes people think they have a good person on their hands and they really don't I still like these four better in fact these these three are by far the top three ways to collect those names and so now that you have those names you understand what your job is you can communicate with them and again I go back to that video and the seven things that that you should never say to a contractor even if you're working with a great one you still want to follow those rules and lastly as we talk about pricing when I was talking about the idea of being clearing your communications I think you should tell the contractor that you're getting other bids they need to know that right and then I tell them I say look I'm gonna get a few more bids I'm not going to just simply take the lowest priced one I'm gonna take the best contractor and I'm gonna let the price you know chips fall where they may because I want contractors to make a buck they've got to be profitable or they're not gonna work with me anymore they got to be profitable because it's important to our economy I have a great video on my profit is good and why that matters to you so I don't want to deeply gouge him and here's the other thing you're never gonna catch a great contractor anyways because they'll always get you back so whether they just don't finish the job on time or whatever happens because they're gonna make their profit no matter what so instead since this is a relationship this isn't like you're just buying some piece of furniture off Craigslist you need to set it from the beginning that you're clearing your communications and then you're not totally crazy price sensitive because that way you're gonna get the best now surprisingly the lowest price doesn't mean the lowest contractor quality if you're working with great ones I had a recent job it was a thirty six thousand dollar concrete job and I hadn't done up to that point that big of a concrete job so I and the Fussell's in a different area so I went looking for some new contractors and the one that I liked the best the one that had the best reputation best reviews I talked to some suppliers that sell concrete they all recommended this guy he ended up coming in the lowest I was thrilled he was hired right he was he was a good five to ten thousand dollars Lauren everybody else and I did tell him that after we got the finalized the deal I gave him his deposit and whatnot I told my said by the way you're the lowest price guy I'm just letting you know you can probably raise your prices in the future I knew I didn't have another concrete job coming up so I wouldn't you know bite myself in the foot but um just keep that in mind too pricing is not always correlated with quality you can correlate quality with all the other aspects of this situation but look at some of the previous work they've done talk to previous customers but be aware this is an important decision and what I've discovered from the pricing perspective is typically pricing changes based on the economy if things are booming and they have tons of jobs if a new job comes along they check the price up because it has to be a better job than the other one they're gonna work on if the economy is bad and things are slow in that area they'll drop their price dramatically just to get the job even if they're great if they don't like you they think you're gonna be a pain in the butt they'll jack the price up and and if you take it I mean they're like hey all the better I mean they're basically paying me for being a pain in the butt but pricing is not correlated necessarily with quality once you're bidding against great contractors however if you've got a crappy one in the mix and never low the lowest priced one you also need to be aware especially if their price is way too low what you're looking for in three bids is all of them to be relatively close together you know within you know five to 10 to 15 percent of each other if somebody's drastically too low then there's a real problem there and obviously if they're drastically too high you're obviously going to throw that up as well there is so much more I could share about this subject but hopefully you have a much better understanding now of how to find great contractors and hopefully one of the big distinction that he discovered was that finding great contractor starts with you being great yourself because then you can attract the kind of people that you really want to work with that are gonna do the best job and obviously here are some tips on how to generate a list of people that could be great our walk Phil obstacles freedom mentor calm if you want to be the first to watch these videos in the future please subscribe to this channel get a copy of my free book how to be a real estate investor and if you want to be a first-class market leading real estate entrepreneur consider my apprentice program where my team and I work hand in hand one-on-one and we teach people how to become absolute money-making machines again thanks so much for watching this video and if you have any comments questions concerns put them down below here I personally respond to these comments I take time out of my schedule to do it I appreciate your watching I'll see you in the next one

Channel: Phil Pustejovsky

Views: 53,938

Rating: 4.8673344 out of 5

Keywords: How to Find Contractors, Great Contractors, Finding Contractors, Phil Pustejovsky, Freedom Mentor

Id: xrlP-LD8NC8

Length: 22min 28sec (1348 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 24 2017