Bohol land wanted

BTW, Good rate on Wise today:

Many thanks for that.

I had a very short chat with Currencies Direct, who offered me 70.15 with no fees. She seemed irritated when I didn't snap her hand off. This one you've suggested saves me £600 on the transaction

You might also bear in mind there are or used to be a few - one off no commission "introductory" deals - if you're intending to do a single large amount at some point.

Can't find any Wise deals that are current. The difference in rates saves me a load though.

I'm sending 930,000, and at 70.15, that's £13257.
At 72.2093 (as above), that's £12879 - a saving of £378.

That's a pretty good introduction!

Anyway, not so good news - talking to my wife today about Bohol and she reminded me they do have quite a few earth quakes there...

Good news - Google - What is the best construction type for earthquakes?

Steel

The best earthquake-resistant construction materials have an important quality in common: high ductility. Ductility refers to the material's ability to move and change shape without breaking or losing strength. Traditionally, steel and wood are the best and most common earthquake-resistant materials.

So another nail in the coffin for CHB.

Seriously the way technology is going, by the time you actually need your dwellings you'll be able to order them online in kit form for a reasonable price, have them dropped in by a drone and put them up yourself - assuming you've got your foundations sorted - so maybe delay will pay...

Originally, I wanted to build in bamboo. The whole project. If you want to Google Eco6 Bali, you'd get an idea of what I was hoping to create.

But that's Bali, and Bali, which, apart from it pissing down every day, doesn't suffer what the Philippines suffers. Earthquakes, typhoons and torrential rain would ruin even treated bamboo eventually, and to be honest, I think the craftsmanship exhibited in Bali far outweighs what I've seen in the Philippines.

From there, the natural progression as far as I saw it was to move to light steel framing. I'd already decided that I wanted to build some A-frame accommodation, and maybe clad it with bamboo or nipa. I was going to aim for the Instagram crowd so they can be sipping on a mocha frappacino while they pose for a photo overlooking some sunlit rice paddie. You know the sort.

To a great extent, I still hope to be able to attract that kind of client. But I need to apply a little more of a pragmatic approach to the longevity of the project. I would like it to still look good in 15 to 20 year so that my wife can flog it off and retire in splendor - I presumably having been pushing up the daisies for a while by then.

The area that we've chosen has little or no accommodation for travelers. I'm not sure whether we are onto a good thing, or on a fool's errand, but I suspect that living down near the Loboc river is not quite the attraction it once was. The Sikatuna Mirror of the World complex is a mile or two down the road, and is on Phase 1 or 2 of 4, and sure to become a popular attraction. The Chocolate Hills are a few miles away, and we sit between the two major Tarsier sanctuaries. As gambles go, I'm fairly confident that even if it's a slow burner, we will have chosen correctly/

I looked at Richard Armstrong's builders and others, such as the horrors of Pierre and Pam Parfaite Channel - another American having the mickey taken out of him by a gang of unskilled labourers, and came to the conclusion that a thick coat of render won't cover the entire multitude of sins, and I'd better come up with a better idea

I had already decided on the LSF house, and was then considering the AAC Starken blocks that Richard was using, at least for the house. But then I came across the Hardie Board range and was smitten.

Light Steel Framing is quick, inexpensive, durable, typhoon resistant, earthquake resistant, not flammable, not prone to rust, termite proof. It's ideal. Hardie boards, correctly applied are all of the above too.

We have the money sitting in PHP in our Wise account. We got 72.203 to the pound, which I'm very happy with. It may possibly increase still further, but to be honest, I would never have hoped for 72 pesos per pound - it's a five-year high, so I'll take it.

Everything is now being compiled - the Philippine Inland Revenue certificate, the original Title, the Deed of sale and the Geodetic/Relocation Survey. It's all being notarised.

We have a lawyer overseeing the purchase. We have a friend of the family observing that it is all above board. She is being coached by another friend who works in the Registry of Deeds, so we have got it all covered there. In one month, there will be a meeting again, with the sellers, the realtor, our lawyer, our observer, and one of Melody's Kuyas, who will have a bag containing 930,000php. On our lawyer's say so, all documents will be surrendered and the payment made. Then the lawyer and Melody's Kuya will head off to Sikatuna to lodge the paperwork, and that is that!

We will be there in March, in Manila first of all, where I will meet with several suppliers of LSF buildings. I may contract them to supply, deliver and fix the frames if possible, as that will ensure the expertise of the steel fixers. We would just need to prepare the foundation slab in Bohol and wait for them to turn up and weave their magic.

If that isn't feasible, we will erect them on site. It's pretty much a case of building the entire panel on the flat, then raising it into position and joining it to the others. Nowhere near as complicated and long-winded as concrete columns and beams.

It's all a long way away, but today was a step in the right direction, despite NatWest attempting to throw a spanner in the works.

I do wonder why you wish to have any excess soil taken off your hands? better to hold onto it for the time being as this may be needed later and I would imagine you will end up terracing this sloping site? you say you will excavate to level off sites for building on but this may not work in every case? if you are thinking to level the site using hardcore this will be very costly, with time on your side and giving time for levelled backfilled soil to settle this will be OK to lay a Monolithic slab on top of it.

One tool that is worth investing in is a good compactor, I'm not talking about a plate vibrator these are only good for the top 50mm, but a big foot, some just call them thumpers, I'm sure you know what I mean.
Pinoys are extremely strong, but sometimes their brute strength causes problems and they end up breaking many tools, this happened on my site so often and I had to take on all the mechanical repairs as they usually end up breaking everything they try to fix, rather than give their own tools a good clean at the end of their shift they much prefer to knock off the hard cement with hammers the next day, working with Pinoys is like working with a bunch of 10yr olds.

At the start of my build I used to feel sorry for these poor chaps working for such low wages, 3yrs ago I was paying them P400 a day around 33% more that they would get anywhere else, this was OK when the initial groundwork was taking place in the first few days, then I started to notice how inefficient they were a one man job usually has two or three men on it, another thing they were very guilty of and that was to take the wheelbarrow to the sand or gravel pile, overfill it and then try to turn it around to go back in the direction they come from only to do the same the next time, added to that they will walk slow with the barrow not realising it is much like riding a bike and that is better to move a little faster to ride over a rough site thus keeping it balanced.

The reason for saying all of the above is; if ever you manage to find this very elusive, rare as hens teeth, good contractor there in PH, this is the calibre of men he has to work with.

One of my men asked if I could give a job to his Uncle BoBo who he says is a great Mason but had been out of work for some time? so I gave him a start only to find out he was useless, he worked a few days then had 3 days off, it was said his Cow had run away, I guess it must have jumped over the moon as he never did return?

Someone I know explained it thusly:

You may wish to sack one of your local crew. Perhaps for being useless. Perhaps for stealing. Perhaps for just not turning up when they're supposed to.

So you sack them.

But they have ten brothers. And each of them has ten offspring. All of a sudden, you're not being spoken to in the market. Your haircut sits crooked on your head. Everything you ask for is 'not available Sir'. You can't get the parts to fix your scooter. Nobody turns up to work, and even if they do, they plod about looking sullen. It goes on and on.

Best to be patient and accept that they're next to useless, but eventually, something at least similar will be built, even though the labour cost is three times what it might have been, based on your calculations. Of Western methods of working. Which cost fifteen times as much.

Ten year olds they might be. But here in the UK, you couldn't get a ten-year-old to put in a twelve-hour shift in that heat.

The channel I mentioned before features a large number of workers out there in the province, all standing about and occasionally moving something from one pile to another. There are six of them putting a coco lumber roof onto a garage. Two working and four pogging about underneath, wearing their tee-shirt around their heads.

Fun, it won't be, but I'm making an effort to simplify the process and minimise the potential for a disaster

72.35 today... not 2005 but creeping up!

If it gets anywhere near 80, I'm going to shift another lump. But it hasn't been there for 15 years as per your graph. A good time to move one's money nonetheless. It will drop down again as the peso regains strength when Christmas approaches due to the OFW remittances I believe.

On an entirely different topic, but for expediency, I'll append it here.

I know that I can't own the land itself, but I understand that I could own 50% of what's built on top of it.

I'm not thinking that my wife is about to turf me out once it's all built - (not that anyone does think these things), but my concern is more that the unlikely strikes, and something happened to her.

If I were to be widowed, and she was the sole owner, as a foreigner, I understand that I would be on a sticky wicket. But as I heard it - from whom I don't recall - as a shareholder in a Corporation that owned all the lock, stock and barrels of the home and business, I could keep it as a going concern, wait for a decent offer to come in, flog it, and as the inheritor of her 50% of the shares, receive the entire amount.

Can anybody throw some light onto this? I know I'm 18 years older than my asawa, and therefore much more likely to be pushing up the daisies long before her, but in my experience in life, just when you think you're safe and sound, along comes fate to kick the legs of the chair out from under you.

Anyone having resolved such a potential banana skin in this fashion and can give factual advice about the formation of such a Corporation would earn a couple of buckets of beer, should they ever come to visit us. Anyone not having done so, but knowledgeable nonetheless would also qualify for the beer.

You could try but you might find one her family suddenly finds a will/sale document that gave it to them!

Actually I think (probably @Jim will know better), if you're married and resident and both of your names are on the title you can inherit it all legally assuming there's no Will - but that may also involve having to give the family a share too... it's more fun in the Philippines

Make sure she has you on the title and deeds of the property. I'v heard different conflicting stories about this, I heard you will be given an amount of time to sell,
and I also heard that the property will be divided between the Filipinas deceased wife's siblings and her spouse. Don't quote me on this I want to find out for sure.

I do not know where you got that info on Bali not being prone to natural disasters compared to the Philippines? when it comes to Earthquakes it is perhaps just as bad, there is a chartered surveyor writes about building in general there in Bali and the way he describes how they do things there seems to compare with PH with the workers being at just the same low standard, check this Guy out Mrfixitbali and you will see this for yourself. I have read just about everything he has to say about house construction and he really does know his stuff, he says the safest house to be inside during quakes are ones done in Bamboo with their ability to flex, I know you mentioned this already and I agree steel has to be the next best thing to Bamboo, although this steel is galvanised it may still rust depending on how good the coating is? then when you cut it or screw into it you have broken the seal, I'm hoping the rice hulls in the cavity of my house will act as a desiccator to some degree but this is entirely guesswork on my part?

I think it must have been a typhoon thing really. It just seems so benign there when I see the videos, but I suppose there aren't many mad dogs and Englishmen wandering around in a storm, making videos.

I'm very interested in what you've built and the experiences you've.....er......experienced whilst building your home. Might pop by and have a look if I'm ever in the area. In the meantime, Mr Fixit Bali will be getting a new subscriber.

Hashtag - Just wishing I was brave enough to do all this in Bamboo