What to do with your shophouse.

[dirtydog]

Shophouses are actually quite good to live in price wise, the rental cost of a shophouse is on par with a small condo unit thats furnished but you have loads more room.

The ground floor can be used as a business premise, the mezzanine as an office and the rest of the floors as accomodation.

Most shophouses are 12 meters deep and just under 4 meters wide,plus a 2 meter open area at the back of the building, this is yours aswell but by law you are not allowed to enclose it, but as 90 percent of people do you may aswell.

Generally they will have a thai style bathroom on each floor, these are the first thing to smash out, yep including the interior walls, unless you believe that you would be happy using a bathroom of just over 2 square meters. The ground floor one normally is under the stairs so basically all you can do with that is retile it and put a proper sit down toilet in there, also if its a business premise people should not be showering in there, although in one of the bars I goto in Ban Chang there are toothbrushes and shampoo etc in the downstairs toilet, I mean this is not something I would do, but occasionly customers do have sex in the toilet with the gals, would you in the heat of the moment use one of those toothbrushes to sexually stimulate a gal, or maybe that turd got stuck above the water line and you have to prod it down with something, yes I for one would not keep my toothbrush in the downstairs of a business premise.

Generally the end units of a block of shophouses are double units, if you wanna start a proper business that is based on lots of customers you do need a double unit to succeed, a single unit looks busy and is hard to find a seat if there are more than 5 people in there, a double unit looks empty with only 10 people in there, and if it is a customer based business you need seating for the people, they do not want to jammed up against some obese sweaty american.

Also with an end unit you can make a seperate entrance at the side near the back if you want to rent rooms or just want to sneak in without the missus catching you, this is quite a good idea if your shirt is covered in lipstick and you dont want to throw it away, another good idea is a couple of times per month when she knows your being faithful,ie you have been with her allday, chuck a load of washing in the washing machine and start it off, this will put you in good stead when you do actually fok up.

So the front of you shophouse upstairs you should have balconeys, these will be generally accessed thru some rotten 400baht ply wood door with horrid louvre windows that probably dont work next to it, so the first thing to do is smash all that out and dump it, including the front wall, this after you have done your block work for room divisions and tiled you will fit nice sliding glass patio type doors, these will let in as much light as you want and cut down on traffic noise if you close them, The new lovely glasswork will cost about 12,000baht per set and is about the last thing to get fitted.

The ceilings are basically concrete plinths that have had a pour of concrete over them, these generally sag in the middle and have differant spacings between then, yep they are damn ugly, so you need a false ceiling, so you get the c line ceiling people in to put in the alloy supports for the celing, then the electrician to run all the cables and fan supports, then the ceiling people can put in your lovely brand new ceiling, dont ask them to paint it unless you want a really awfull job, they are plasters not painters, yes i know thais reckon they are jacks of all trades but please believe me they are not.

More to come next week including pics

[Marmite the Dog]

I'm just about to rent a 4 storey place, brand new for 12k a month. Its not too far from Kenk's place, so I might have to pop over for tea & biccies sometimes.

[Four N' Twenty Magpie]

If that's the place on the corner, 4 doors down and recently renovated, I feel really sorry for ya Ken.


P.S Don't invite him in for some wacky, he'll just stare at the ceiling.

[Marmite the Dog]

If that's the place on the corner, 4 doors down and recently renovated, I feel really sorry for ya Ken.


P.S Don't invite him in for some wacky, he'll just stare at the ceiling.

Its actually on the other side of the 'new road' a couple of miles away, and its not for me to live in; only for work.

And yes, no-one should ever offer me any wacky when I've been drinking. Fatal! ops:

[dirtydog]

Anyway to get back on subject

here's one I made earlier.



This is now a no underwear bar, it's actually quite good, erm GC, it's the gals that don't wear underwear...

[dirtydog]

[dirtydog]

[repoulinjr]

When is it open for business?

[Lily]

^Are you still working on it DD?

At an hourly rate?

[dirtydog]

It has been open for a couple of years or more already, looking for another building for him in Pattaya to make another place.