We just finished a pretty significant remodel and used a GC that was an acquaintance of ours. He was amazing and honest and I will never do another project with anybody else. He has a masters degree in geology and is a GC because he doesn't like having a boss and likes taking 2-3 months off/year. He doesn't have to be a GC. A lot of these folks got into contracting because they could hide their flaws which would be totally unacceptable in a normal work environment (like lying all the time, never, ever showing up on time, forgetting stuff endlessly, etc.).
Our GC gave me this piece of insight which was amazingly helpful:
When getting bids, you will generally encounter 3 types of GC's.
(1) The overbidder. They are super busy and don't care if they get the job, so they over-bid. If they get it, fine - they'll make a ton of $. If not, they don't care.
(2) The underbidder. This is the most common. He said the way this works is they look at your plans (we had plans w/ the city) or your ideas and they evaluate where they are going to be able to make up their gap between their bid and the actual cost. They do this by looking for errors or omissions in the plans or places in your house that they can claim there was no way to anticipate a situation, etc., do the math, then bid low. All the while they know exactly where they will change order you to get back up to the normal amount (usually fair, sometimes even higher if they're really dishonest). My brother hired a guy like this. He and his wife nicknamed him "change order charlie"
(3) The balanced bidder. They take an honest look at the project and the costs calculate how long it will take them, how much money they need/want to make, then give you a bid that they think is fair and accurate.
FYI, he first gave a verbal rough bid based on some general calculations ($/sq. foot; average kitchen costs, etc.) which ended up being about 15% lower than the actual bid. He said doing a formal bid takes him from 5-12hrs, depending on the size of the project. His bid had line-by-line budget amounts for everything. He was amazingly professional.
Of course, YMMV. Another telling item: our GC only subs out roofing and plumbing (high liability items). He does everything else himself. Yes, it makes the project take longer, but he said he can control costs better that way (and make a bit more) and, more importantly, he said most subs are terrible and he ends up fixing their crappy work anyway. I was his "helper" / grunt on the project, btw, and freaking everything the guy said was true.
Best of luck in your search. If it were me, I'd keep looking until I found a solo guy with a good rep who you click with.
