Quote Originally Posted by DrAndy View Post
you will lose out whatever happens; the guy will never pay you the difference, even though his wife signed a bit of paper

maybe he is not interested in continuing as it was too cheap?
Very true and now I am 100% sure the original price was too cheap. But if it can be completed for 20% more than the original price, I will be very pleased.

BUT NOW ON WITH THE UP-DATE

It was seven months since the Builder walked away from Jan’s house and despite many promises and failing to comply with his written undertakings, an agreement has been reached.

After two further broken promises, the police called him to Police Station and after a few hours of negotiation he agreed pay Jan B 200,000 and she could get someone else to finish the house. The bad news is that he has to pay B50,000 every two weeks starting 15 November, but the good news is that both the Police and the head man witnessed the agreement and warned him of the consequences. The Police have assured Jan that if he fails to make one payment, it should be quite a quick job to get a court order against him and then she can take his house or farm.

I was reasonably happy with the result as with the money not yet paid to the builder, it would give Jan B400,000 to finish a house that only has a few repairs and the finishes to complete.

As she does not want to trust another builder, she has employed the local carpenter and a gang of workers who will complete everything for B70,000 while she pays for the materials. Her dad is helping, but it’s an enormous job for a young girl who also has to try to run her shop at the same time…….or as my old dada would say, it’s all good character building stuff.

The past couple of weeks have been spent organising the window construction, ordering the external wood, wood stain, preservative, nails, sand, cement, etc. But finally there is some progress as they started on the last bit of structural work, which is the staircase.




So over the coming weeks I hope to be able to provide a report on how an Issan girl manages to complete her house.

Cheers