Here’s an update on the two lots we purchased in the Philippines! You can see the previous posts on this series here:

https://www.marriedafilipina.com/2018/07/why-the-hell-would-you-buy-property-in-the-philippines-part-1/

https://www.marriedafilipina.com/2018/07/why-the-hell-would-you-buy-a-lot-in-the-philippines-part-2/

https://www.marriedafilipina.com/2018/08/why-the-hell-would-you-want-to-buy-a-lot-in-the-philippines-part-3/

https://www.marriedafilipina.com/2018/08/why-the-hell-would-you-buy-a-lot-in-the-philippines-part-4/

The house that Janet built for her family in Alcoy, Cebu is complete! The project started about a year ago with the purchase of the lot. The building of the house itself took about 3 1/2-4 months, which is pretty damn good in the Philippines. As other blogs in this series detailed, Janet functioned as her own contractor, hiring an architect (mostly just a guy who drew up the blueprints), a foreman named “Boy” who hired and oversaw the crew. She purchased all the materials herself from the few sources available in the area, always complaining to me, “I could have gotten this cheaper in Dumaguete!”

As for me, I visited occasionally, inspecting the work and nodding wisely, as if I knew anything about construction, let alone construction in the Philippines. The Foreman, crew and Janet’s family acted as if I was the big cheese, despite the fact that I insisted that it was funded mostly by Janet. Members of the family worked very hard to assist the crew. Her father was there everyday, all the while still managing to work his farm. I have no idea how he does it; he’s not that much younger than me and I have barely enough energy in the day to go to the mall.

Janet’s brothers all pitched in and the sisters and kids worked every weekend. I mostly sat and watched and nodded approvingly.

Several brothers and sisters kicked in cash for some things that were not in the budget, like tile and bedroom doors and we really appreciated their efforts.

Yet still, our original budget turned up pretty short of the goal. Janet ended up kicking in some extra cash from her personal bank account. I managed to kick in some extra cash without touching our bank accounts which I was determined not to touch. I can make a snide remark about my heritage and upbringing but the truth is I have always been pretty good at this finding extra money business. And for all you wiseasses, the means I employed were completely legal!

The building process was frustrating. Janet went to Southern Cebu every weekend to inspect progress, meet with “Boy” and purchase the next week’s materials as instructed by Boy. Invariably his estimates were wrong. If he asked for 20 bags of cement, you could bet that by Wednesday, Janet was receiving a message that they needed another 10. Yells and curses would ensue. Finally Janet starting to leave a little cash with her mother for these weekly emergencies.

When it was all finally done Janet asked her mother how soon they would move in. “We can’t move in. There’s no kitchen.” “Of course there was a kitchen,” Janet replied, including a new gas cooktop donated by sister, Jonna. “But there’s no dirty kitchen,” a near necessity in the Philippines. So the men took up the task to build a dirty kitchen, behind the interior kitchen.

In the end the local Alcoy priest was brought in for a house blessing and a party was held, including two pigs that Janet had raised for just such an event. We think that at least 200 people were fed.

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To see a video of the house and blessing party, go here.

Now that we’ve gotten the Alcoy house out of the way, let’s talk about our house, in Valencia, Negros Oriental.

It’s taken about three months to prep the property, get the permits and build the wall around the perimeter. Now, while this isn’t quite the size of Trump’s wall, it’s a big wall surrounding a 1355 sq. meter property. The wall is roughly completed; the gate should be done soon. In the meantime the house has been laid out and the crew is struggling to dig the holes for the 16 concrete posts. I say struggling because the property is filled with huge rocks bordering on boulder size. Our contractor is considering renting a jack hammer to break up the rocks, an extreme measure for house construction in the Philippines.

The local power company visited the property this week and told the contractor he had to construct a permanent concrete pole for electricity. Everyone else in our area has falling apart temporary wooden poles (more like sticks) to hold up their power lines. But the crew is now building the steel reinforced concrete pole and hope to have the electricity installed early next week. We’ll see!

The estimate is that it will take three months to complete the basic concrete structure of the house, which would be about the end of February. Again, we’ll see.

In the meantime Janet gets to spend lots of time looking at tile and colors, and appliances, and all the things that go along with building a dream house.

Although I know nothing about home construction and construction in the Philippines I am having fun watching the process. For those who would like to see videos about the building process, please go to my vlog and subscribe: https://youtu.be/_OwI88GeZpo