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Here are some sites for house plans;
Click on the picture to take you to their website.

Well now you need someone to build your dream home, the nightmare has just started, now Thai builders are quite good, but alas they are using Thai materials, now I am not going to say use me, mainly because we have to use Thai materials aswell.

The first thing to do is get three quotes, one of these you will find is a rip off merchant, he will most likely be fifty percent more expensive, he is probably not your best choice, the other two will most likely be quite close in price so choose who you feel most confident with. a good test is always to hand the plans to the builder upside down and see how long it takes him to turn them the right way up.

As the job progressess you will most likely add extra jobs to the list of things you want, please try to remember that these are not included in the quote and will cost more, and if your an old git with a dodgy memory write it down or pay for it straight away so there is no confusion on billing.

Now I could post pages on the lack of materials and tools in Thailand but i wont bother, I will just discuss ceramic tiles, now 5 years ago they used to sell all the grade “A” tiles here, now all the grade “A” tiles are sold to foriegn countries and the grade “:B” tiles are now sold as grade “A”, yep, things dont look good, how good a job of tiling a floor could you do if there is upto a 3mm differance in tile size, actually I shall keep this thread here on tiling, now in the UK we would have nice level floors and walls and would just use tile adheshive,damn its a quick way to make a few bucks, but unfortuneately here nothing is straight or level, so we have to use cement, we are then looking at about 10 square meter of wall tiling per day per guy, and before people start this is in bathrooms so there is a lot of cutting, now a good tiler will charge 140baht per square meter for an easy job..

Anyway back to the most important stuff, this is the time to decide on what stuff is undergroud, phonelines and power cables are a good start.

A special note to Americans, shouting at the Thai contractor will not in any way help him to understand English any better whatsoever,yep, believe it or not the louder something is shouted will not make the language that they do not speak easier to understand, also calling them Thai monkeys will not help in anyway whatsoever.
actually it is probably best if Americans dont even consider building a home here in Thailand.

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This is something rarely seen on Thai houses, This I believe is due to if it is raining they will not go outside anyway, even if they were supposed to be at work several hours ago.

But without guttering over a few years you will find concrete areas around your building slowly subsiding.

Generally there are two types of guttering used here in Thailand, Galvanised which lasts about 5 years and looks crap and costs about 200baht per meter length, Then we have lovely stainless steel guttering, this stuff is lovely to see and looks great for years on end, but again it comes down to the price, yep, you got to reckon on 700baht per meter length, and when your costing it don’t forget the downpipes, these are not free, you wouldn’t believe the amount of customers that question me on the meterage, they look round their nice roof and tell me that it is only 2 runs of 15 meters, they seem to ignore the 2 8 meter long down pipes, anyway these are fitted prices.

Of course for a more traditional look you could always use bamboo.

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Well I have to admit that I started this blog as like just a one off thing and was just going to leave it at that, but after hundreds of emails begging me to carry on with it, I shall.

ps, thks mom, but stop spamming my email account……

So onto cabinets and cupboards made in Thailand, now this is the fitted stuff not your mfi gear.

Cabinets and cupboards etc are made using veneered ply wood and 2 by 1 inch plinths as supports, now some of this stuff actually looks quite good, but to my mind it seems quite expensive, i mean when a counter starts at 8,000baht per meter length using ply wood that costs 500baht per sheet and untreated 2 by 1inch wood it does seem a bit much, OK its quite labour intensive and there is a good profit in it, shame its an illegal business for farangs..

I also know of several teak furniture manufacturers, now using real teak wood nearly doubles the cost, but this is real teak wood, ie stuff that gets passed down from generation to generation, the old veneered ply stuff you will probably chuck out after five years or so, so its quite obvious in what to invest your money into.

Also you will find many kitchen manufacturers here that supply euro style kitchens, the only problem with these of course is that the carcas is made from mdf board, now this country is hot and humid and the floors are mopped everyday, yep that mdf is like a sponge and expands like nobodies business, the best way to get round this is to put a tile/marble/granite or real wood skirt round the whole of the base of all the kitchen units, it actually looks quite nice, well as long as its granite.

Kitchens are pretty damn expensive and here is a real expensive one.

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So, here we all are living in Thailand, and you finally got enough dosh to move out of that bedsit and build your own house.

But first you need some land, now manys the horror story I have heard where someone has purchased land from someone other than the owner, then the owner tends to get a bit uppity that you are building on his land, this is usually resolved when you pay way over the odds for the land to the proper owner, so now you have paid 2 times and more than 2 times the value for the land, not a good start at all.

So what you have to do, is first agree to the price, then drag the owner down to the land office with all the relevant papers and the cash in your back pocket, once everything is signed up and transferred then pay the owner, simple really aint it, well its not really cos you have got the hassle of whose name to put the land in or what company name to put the land etc etc.

Anyway while you are in the land office arrange for them to come down and stake out your land, this is mainly cos us builders get confused and build walls in the wrong place and that sort of thing, now here in pattaya they charge 3,500baht, it can take up to a month for them to come and stake it out though, but now your in a rush cos your all excited and that, well the good news is that for 3,500baht without a reciept they will also come and do it that evening,BUT, instead of using the little concrete round posts they will use wooden posts and bang them into the ground to stake it out.

Now you are on a roll, you got all that sorted out in less than 24 hours, so tomorrow you want the builders to start, well basically all the builders can do is build a perimter wall that is less than 2 meters high,yep, no house yet, you havent got planning permission yet, now the quickest way to start is to go to city hall with some rough plans and ask the nice gentleman there if they have someone that can draw up proper plans for you and sort out the planning permission etc, but now you are really rolling, doing it this way means you can start building the same day, ok this will cost about 40,000baht as opposed to 10,000baht doing it the long way, but your plans are guaranteed to be passed.

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Now in the UK bricks are baked, so then they are extremely strong and can hold up a lot of weight, here unfortuneately those little red things that Thais call bricks are sun baked and these cannot withstand a lot of weight, so generally everything is supported by concrete beams and posts and the bricks are just used for infill, ie making the walls and that sort of thing.Anyway here is a nice picture of beam work.

Now generally for the footings these will be hand dug out, ie a dozen Thais with shovels, yes it does take longer than using a digger but it saves at least 500baht, so for that day you have lost the contractor has made an extra 500baht, a wheeled digger costs 2,500baht per day, and the big beasty track macro 7,500baht per day, hey now dont start complaining as that 500baht could usefully be used down soi yodsak, yes even us builders have needs.

Ahhh, I nearly forgot to mention an important aspect about making walls, in good old blighty we would render and then plaster the walls, it gives a lovely smooth finish, but alas here, the walls are only rendered off, yep it just dont look as good.
although in Sri Lanka they use white cement to plaster the walls and that seems to work fine and gives a nice finish.

Well I have been looking for a nice picture of a hole to post so you can get the feel of what a hole for the footings should look like, well I shall try to explain it, for a two storey house reckon on a one meter deep hole about 1 meter wide, anyway here is a nice picture of a hole that we put marble in and made into a swimming pool.

Of course there are many ways to make the form and wood is damn expensive here.

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Now windows are quite important for non vampire type people, I think I shall start with window frames.
1: wooden window frames.
now wood does look nice and it is traditional, but it has its drawbacks, the wood here isnt seasoned so it tends to warp, also being so humid it expands and contracts and cracks, also it needs continual maintenance.
2: Aluminum window frames.
Now these are nice, low maintenance etc but about three times the price of wooden window frames, yep these guys work on a 100 percent profit margin.
3: Plastic frames with double glazing.
WOW, are these expensive, but then again the best always costs the most, if your into 24 hour aircon then these are the windows for you.

Hmmm, now onto glass, now glass comes in many widths, starting from 3 mm upto 12 mm.
now generally a contractor will use 5mm glass, but for the extra 2baht per sq foot you may as well upgrade to 6 mm glass, now clear glass is the cheapest and doesnt retain as much heat as smoked or tinted glass, if memory serves me correct that blue glass is the most expensive, but its pretty damn sexy.

I hear the shouts for how much does this all cost, well using aluminum frames and smoked glass you can reckon on 1000baht per sq met, thats pretty much the cheapest you will get.

I suppose i should add mossie screens to this section, reckon about 200baht per sq met or a little bit less if you get lucky.

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Now you have got to live in this house and half the time the world is dark, so you need lights, Now you could stick one light in the middle of each ceiling and make your lovely home look like a typical Thai slum or you could be creative, electric cable and lights are not expensive here…

Now this last house we done, the living room has two main areas, so we set up each area with 3 sets of lighting, uplighting for those romantic evenings when your not sure whether you will get her upstairs to bed or not, picture lighting to highlight all the pictures etc, and wall lighting for general use.

Now light bulbs come in white, which are perfect for an office or kitchen, or warm white, which is a nice soft white suitable for a house.

Actually I shall add to this as lighting and garden lighting is so important.

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OK, we are back to wood again, this is something you do not want in your roof or holding up your ceiling, yes, the contractor will lie to you saying that the insects wont want to live there, but they havent told the insects that yet, you really want as little wood as possible.

Now most roofs are made using iron, infact I believe its cheaper than wood now, although we still charge the same price, jees welding is a skilled job, although I have to admit that most Thais wouldnt be able to get a welding job overseas, hey, you think its too expensive? then get up on that roof yourself and weld it up, jees you cheapskates.
Ok, roofing costs: cheap cement board tile roofs about 600baht per sq met, these are the 60 cm by 120cm tiles. the monier tiles which are damn heavy and thick need a lot more steel, so your looking at 2,000baht per sq met at least.

Ahhhh, the ceilings i here you ask, ok just use “c line” its alloy supports and real quick and easy and costs about 220baht per sq met, but upgrade it to the lined stuff that reflects the heat, yep it may cost you and extra 20baht per sq met but its worth it.

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ok door frames are shite here, but what do you expect for 500baht, now these can be clad with a nice hard wood surround and they can look quite good, but your still using a door frame that basically looks like shite, are you willing to pay more money to make it look good? think about it when you deal with your contractor, are you willing to spend that extra 400baht to have it nicely sanded down? will that take you over budget?
generally most farangs expect wood products to be in a good state when they buy them, sadly its not true, in thailand the wood products are basically in a very bad state.

the doors here havent been seasoned, so buy them at the beginning of your house building and store them.
Now you can buy a nice hardwood door for about 2,500baht, yes ok teak goes up to 8,000baht per door but most of the cheap bastards on the net dont go for teak.

Here is a pic of some teak doors we bought in Chang Mai, 13,000baht for the pair but they were actually seasoned, well either that or old stock, they both still needed 2 days worth of sanding down though to get them up to scratch so to speak.

So now we are thinking of fittings, well all that brass shite looks good for about a month, then it discolors and scratches, so we learn that we really should go with stainless stuff, also most thais use 4 inch hinges, now these look massive on a normal door. so tell erm to use 3 and a half inch hinges and put more on, 4 hinges on a door is ok…

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