In the beginning...



View from Dining area into Living room on nearly completed house

My wife and I embarked on an endeavor to build a house in the Philippines a few years ago. I regret not documenting my experiences from the beginning real time but since it has now been completed I still wanted to reflect on some of our experiences and kind of get a feel for the whole blogging thing while possibly lending some useful information to those interested in or planning to build a house in the Philippines now or in the future. We started out on this adventure without any real planning, there was some circumstances surrounding our family that prompted us to look at building on a small lot we had helped them acquire some decade earlier. It was quite by coincidence that at that same time we were in the planning stages for a major renovation of our home in Virginia when all this transpired. We realized that while improvements to our home would be nice that money would be far better served in providing a permanent home for our family to enjoy and to pass on to future generations.   So with that decided I began to draw up some simple floor plans that I thought would be well suited to our small 104sq/m lot. With those in hand I had my brother in law canvas some architectural companies and see what they could propose based on my drawings and within a predetermined budget. We looked at the top three and selected the design we thought offered the best solution for us. Since we were going to be building in close quarters we thought it would be important to try to employ a design that brought in as much natural light as possible, knowing that it would be limited due to the closeness of the adjacent structures. The design we selected managed to bring natural light into every room, and was arranged to take maximum advantage of the air flow through windows and doors to provide as much opportunity to provide some relief through natural means. The basic design provided for four bedrooms and two bathrooms upstairs and a living/dining/kitchen space down stairs as well as another full bathroom and a bodega under the staircase. Another feature was an “L” shaped passage along one side and the back of the house that would be nearly fully enclosed that would accommodate the dirty kitchen, laundry area, water pump, LP tanks, plus storage for mopeds, bikes etc. this has proved to be a great feature of the house since it prevents a lot of traffic into and through the house. Another design decision we included was high ceilings, in fact we did not install ceilings on the first floor at all, and this is another idea which I believe has been a big contributor to keeping the first floor as cool as practical by allowing hot air to rise above head level. Before I go any farther I want to thank my family who spent countless hours and put their lives on hold to supervise and oversee the construction in my absence. In particular my brother-in-law without whom this project could never have come to a successful conclusion without his constant and untiring vigilance to ensuring things progressed as intended and who along with his daughters kept their best interest and my finances closely monitored and well protected even when the original contractor was found lacking and was able to preserve the value of the already invested funds and navigate through dismissal of the original contractor and hiring of a new workforce to complete our home. Without a doubt this was the key to the success of this project. Pictures