Writing punch lists before the photos turned into standing work

An agent I met through a framing crew asked if I'd walk a 7,200 square foot house with her before it listed. Her problem was that she could see the house wasn't ready and couldn't put words to it in a way the seller would act on. I can, because I spent years building the things she was looking at.

I walked it for two hours with a phone and a notepad. 61 items. Sorted into three groups: do before photos, do before showings, disclose and leave alone. The last group is the one she cared about most, because the seller was about to spend money on a foundation crack that a report would explain in one sentence and a buyer's engineer would price at nothing.

I charged $650. She got a document she could hand to a seller who wanted to argue.

What came out of it: she's used me on four more, same fee, and on one of them the seller hired my old crew for $34k of the do-before-photos list. I didn't take a cut of that and I'd do it that way again, because getting paid twice on the same referral is how you stop getting referrals.

The part that nearly broke it was the first draft. I wrote it like a contractor, all abbreviations and trade shorthand, and she sent it back and said the seller won't read this. Rewrote in plain sentences with a cost range next to each item. That version got signed off in a day.