House flip scope of work checklist

A scope of work is the list you price before a repair number goes into an offer. Without the list, the number is a mood. With the list, a contractor can bid the same job you underwrote, and you can see which line moved when the bid comes back higher. The rehab estimator on this site turns square footage and a tier into a low total and a high total. It does not name the rooms. This checklist is the list. The tier is the band you compare the list’s total against.

What each line should say

Every line needs five things, or it is a label and not a scope. Name the room or the system. Say what is there now, in words a person who has not seen the house can understand. Say what “done” means, because “update the kitchen” is how two bids differ by the cost of the cabinets. Mark whether the line is in this project or deferred until after the sale. Put a dollar allowance on the lines that are in this project. Deferred work stays on the page so you do not forget it, and it stays out of the sum.

Split labor and materials when you know them. When you do not, one allowance is fine if “done” is specific enough that the allowance cannot quietly become a different product. “Replace the dishwasher with a builder-grade unit” is a line. “Make the kitchen nicer” is not. Include dumpsters, protection of finished floors, and the permit fee on their own lines when the city requires a permit. A per-square-foot tier feels like it includes those, and sometimes the bid does not.

The rooms and systems to walk

Walk in the same order every time so a missing section is obvious. Kitchen first: cabinets, counters, appliances, sink, and the floor in that room. Then each bathroom on its own line, not one line called “baths,” because a house with two baths is two scopes. Then whole-house flooring, interior paint, exterior paint or siding, the roof, and the three systems people bundle until the bid arrives: HVAC, electrical, and plumbing. A cosmetic project can still have a zero on HVAC. Write the zero. A blank looks the same as “I forgot the furnace” when you are adding the column later.

Match the tier language the estimator already publishes, so the base and the list describe the same job. Cosmetic, at $20 per square foot, is paint, flooring, fixtures, and landscaping on a house that is livable but dated. Moderate, at $40 per square foot, reaches kitchen and bath updates, appliances, and some system work. Gut renovation, at $80 per square foot, is down to the studs: new systems, layout changes, and permits. Those figures are the bases the report starts from. The report also adjusts for age and property type. A bid far above the tier total is a signal to read the scope again, not a rounding error. Those bases are planning figures for a whole house. They are not a bid for your zip code, and this page does not add city-by-city prices on top of them.

You can check a total on the rehab estimator by entering the square footage and choosing the tier you think you wrote. The page multiplies that size by the tier base and shows one total. If your scope sums well above that total, either the tier was too small or a line is a different project than the one you are offering on. If the sum is well below that total, look for a missing system before you congratulate yourself on a cheap rehab. A total that forgot the roof is not a deal. It is an incomplete list.

Lines a listing can hide

Some conditions show up as words in a listing rather than as a room you can photograph from the curb. The deal score looks for foundation wording, septic, well water, and lead or asbestos wording, along with age and a few size flags. This checklist does not turn those words into a national dollar amount. A foundation mentioned in a listing might be a hairline crack or a wall that needs piers. The honest scope line is “inspect and price,” and the repair number you type into an offer stays provisional until that inspection has a figure.

Treat “inspect and price” as a gate, not as a zero. If you still want a cosmetic tier while that line is open, say so in writing on the scope: cosmetic everywhere else, and this system unknown. Do not let the unknown system inherit the cosmetic base. The same rule applies to a roof you could not walk and a panel you could not open. Unknown is a status. It is not a discount on the tier.

When the inspection returns a number, add it into the sum and run the offer again. A $12,000 sewer line does not fit in a leftover rounding gap. It is a new line, and the maximum allowable offer falls by about that amount because repairs are subtracted once, in full, in the offer formula. Confirm that on the MAO calculator by raising the repair field and reading the new offer. The profit reserve does not absorb the sewer line for you.

From the list to the offer and the hold

Add only the lines marked in this project. That sum is the repair input. Keep the worksheet. When a contractor’s bid replaces an allowance, change that line and add the column again. Do not edit the total from memory. The next offer, and the next conversation with a buyer, should use the new sum the same day the bid changes.

The scope also sets the month count you use for holding. A gut with permits is not a six-week paint job, and the holding guide prices each extra month from the purchase price rather than from the rehab total. Holding costs on a house flip is where that month count turns into dollars. If the scope says the house cannot be listed until a permit closes, those weeks belong in the hold even though no carpenter is on site.

A buyer who plans to refinance instead of resell still needs this list. Cash they leave in the property is purchase plus rehab, and the rehab half is this sum. A scope you described as cosmetic and then built as a gut changes whether the new loan covers the cash. That test is on the BRRRR refinance page, and it will use whatever rehab number you give it. Give it the sum from this checklist, not a cheaper tier you liked better.

Questions