I've got some big turns recently, and it is a mix of flooring work (replacing carpet), cabinets/countertop, and painting. Plus of course some appliances here and there.

I don't have go-to vendors/contractors and so finding 4-5 different vendors is quite a pain (not to mention reaching out to 3x that number for bids).

Am I the only one?

Anyone have a good tactic or tool to make this process easier/faster?

Local FB Services group. Ask for recommendations. You will get a lot. You might also get who NOT to use privately, so accept private messages.

Require Insurance and complete W-9s of course. Ask for three recommendations where you could at least privately interview Customer, if not actually see the work. This is key because the contractor's friends and family are local too. You need their local CUSTOMERS.

Then if you can, get a proper written quote. The written part is key because if they don't have a way to do this, they are fly by nights.

We will accept a text quote, btw. Lots of young guys do everything on phone.

I keep a list at least three deep of all professional contractors, but that's mainly for finding someone with room on their calendar to get to me quickly. The number 1 slot is the one who can get the work done accurately, in a reasonable time frame, and has a history of giving me good pricing. Reliability and confidence in the process is worth it to me, even if they aren't always THEE lowest possible price. If #1 is available, he gets the job. If not, then I go to #2 and so on.

In other words, I'm not constantly requesting bids for things. Most stuff is just, "I need this done, how soon can you do it?" I found that once you ask for 3 bids and don't hire someone, they start to ignore you. So unless there's a significant win on pricing, I don't bother bidding out everything.

I also have a "jack of all trades" handy man, and I just give him all the generic stuff. He does light electrical, plumbing, flooring, tree work, painting, etc.

When I have multiple turnovers at the same time, I prioritize them by whichever one I can get to the market the quickest. I DIY pretty much everything, because it’s a whole lot easier.

Thanks for the responses so far! The FB group and having a strong contractor network (or doing the work myself) are good tips!

Curious though, how long did it take you to cultivate that 3 professional deep list of contractors (per topic area I presume)? And how many units do you have to be a key customer of theirs?

We no longer bid out everything either. Now and again we'll get a second to double-check if our regular guys are still giving us decent prices but otherwise, once we've found someone reliable and honest, we just go with them.

Roofer: we've been using the same guy for 20 years. Now and again as in this week for instance, we'll have another guy bid the same job - and our roofer has always been so close to the next guy that we just stick with him. On this job he was about $1k more but he's legit, has a real business and we have his tax and insurance info. Also we can call him for a leak or other minor jobs and he will help us. He's covered a roof in the middle of a storm for us when it suddenly started leaking, for instance, without charge, because he will get the roof job later.

Painter: ours is really slow as he is doing other jobs at the same time, but he's pleasant, honest and eventually gets the job done. He'd work faster if we asked him. Again, we have his tax info, etc.