Buying Land

[Roger Boots Brown]

hi there my name is roger I was hoping to find out if married to a phillipina you can buy land in the province and build yourself I hope you can help,,,,,,,,,,, thank you roger

[Old55]

If your wife is a Filipina and a citizen of Philippines she can buy property. You can then build a house on that property.

Foreigners are not allowed to own real estate except in some cases condos.

As a Foreigner you may be allowed to lease property and build a house but not own the property the house sits on.

Edited October 17, 2015 by Old55

[Dave Hounddriver]

You are going to find as many opinions as there are members.  Bottom line, for me, is that your filipina spouse or gf can do it but all you can do is provide the cash and trust in her.  But as my 'signature' says .  . . (feel free to read it  :hystery:  )

[chris49]

hi there my name is roger I was hoping to find out if married to a phillipina you can buy land in the province and build yourself I hope you can help,,,,,,,,,,, thank you roger

 

Yes, it is a good plan. I won't go into the risks, but there are some.

 

If undertaking such a project, preferably it should be in a "friendly" area, maybe where the wife has relatives around. Good if you have the money to buy the land and build in 3-4 stages. There is no luxury lifestyle in the province, so you might want to gauge distance to the nearest town, supermarkets, banks, medical care, maybe schools.

 

If building, you should be on site. Ref 2 other recent excellent threads on the topic. If you are up to it, it might mean living in some kind of temporary accom, like a bamboo hut, for a short time.

 

Everything here is paid in cash. So again, if you have the money, it's a good idea. But if you are short of cash, forget it from the start.

 

Nice if you trust your partner enough to do this. There's a place on the Title Deed of a house that says she is the owner. There's is a place on the Title which says the house cannot be sold without your permission. However, remote provinces might not issue deeds, only the Deed of Sale for the land. As I said there are risks attached.

[Ynot]

Ive built and lost a house in Australia, 1st marriage, Ive built and lost a house in Thailand and Australia, 2nd marriage, and one day i hope to build a small place in the Philippines, but this time hopefully not lose it!

[chris49]

Ive built and lost a house in Australia, 1st marriage, Ive built and lost a house in Thailand and Australia, 2nd marriage, and one day i hope to build a small place in the Philippines, but this time hopefully not lose it!

 

I lost 2, but gained one from my current wife. Her share of family land.  I lost one in Sril Lanka but had a deal with the ex wife to use the place, another farm, when I want. Was there for a month in 2012, staying free, might go again. I lost one in QC, still under negotiation, my chances of getting anything, quite low.

 

The OP should get more familiar with the risks, or maybe he has an idea already.

 

If you love the woman, and get legally married, there are things most men would like to do for the partner. Building a modest house in the province is one of them. My advice would be to keep it modest and small, maybe 2 bedrooms, master bedroom and guest room. At least try to deter relatives from trying to move in.

[Bohol Guy]

Thankfully never lost a filipina wife, just one since '97, very happy indeed. However yes, takes a lot of trust. People change and who you both are now won't be who you are in a decade. Make an effort to grow together.

[sonjack2847]

This was posted by another member a while ago maybe it will help you.

I just wanted to share this in case it is of use or interest to any other members as I've just been through the process. If anyone has any questions let me know.

Having just been through the process of buying and renovating a property in the Philippines I thought I would post my experiences here (and the lessons I learned) in case they may be of use to another expat who is going through the same process.
After spending many months (and talking to many middlemen) we finally found a property with a clean title that suited our needs. It has two buildings on it, one two story place with a store and an apartment and one three bedroom bungalow set on 266 SQM about 2kms back from the beach. Both were in need of some “TLC” (we had to gut and completely renovate the bungalow) but the price was very much right.  The owner was in a position where they had to sell due to financial issues and we got them for 1.6 million peso instead of the original 3 million peso asking price. Let me say that this was not a case of good luck, we must have viewed at least 50 properties in the area before we settled on this one.

That left enough in the kitty to do whatever renovations were required. The renovation included new glass for all the windows, knocking down walls, replacing large parts of the roof and a comprehensive paint job as well as installing a full western style kitchen and re-tiling the whole place. We also replaced all the plumbing fixtures.  Initially I was dealing with a local guy who works for me (he is our family driver and all-rounder). A great guy but the people he found were a nightmare (15 minutes to grout one tile unless I was standing over their shoulder).

I called in a friend of mine from Baguio who was in the construction industry in the US and he came down and project managed the renovation for me. He was here for a week, cost me 5,000 pesos (and about 5,000 Pale Pilsens) and saved me close to 50,000 had they kept moving at the same rate they had been.

If you have access to someone you trust (especially if they’re a foreigner) it’s worth the money to have them provide some oversight. I’m a computer programmer by trade who has basically never laid a tile or anything like that. His help made a huge difference and he cost me far less than he saved me.

I’ve gotten a little ahead of myself here. Before you get to the renovating process you’ve got to buy the thing. This can be a very complex process in the Philippines. Keep away from Tax Declaration property, buy something titled if you can. Also I made the decision to hire a lawyer to take care of everything for me, again I saw spending 15,000 pesos on his services as no major when I was looking at the level of investment I was looking at. There are plenty of people who will suggest you do it all yourself and that it’s easy enough. Let’s put it this way, as I read recently in a forum. “Property fraud is just about a national pass time in the Philippines”. If you’re planning on spending a couple million peso and you’re not prepared to spend 15k on a lawyer then to my mind you’re extremely clever with your pennies but very dumb with your pounds!

Not all titled property is created equal, you’ve got to make sure that you get a certified true copy of the document from the register of deeds.  If there is a lien on the property you’ll inherit it with the title. In our case there was an open lien on it (the title documents had been lost and reissued in 2008 so there is a notation on the title stating that anyone who wishes to lay claim to a lien can do so). I had this removed. We then purchased the property in my girlfriend’s 
name and had a lien in my name annotated on the title. The reasoning behind this was that an annotated lien takes precedence over any older claimaints that are not annotated.  This also means that she can’t sell the property without my approval.

Anyway, back to the renovation.  We’re just in the final stages now of finishing up the bungalow (basically housekeeping stuff). To strip, gut and pretty much rebuild the thing has cost me about half a million in materials and labor.  That also included about 150k in appliances.

I could have saved a lot of money if I’d gone for cheaper materials but for me renovation is more about longevity that it is about economy.

The final outcome? We’ve separated the two properties onto separate titles and already have an offer on just the bungalow at 3.2 mil. The two story blue building is being taken up another two levels and will contain a store plus three apartments above it which we will rent out then go and repeat what we've just done with another run down property.

I wanted to post this because so often expats post horror stories about investing in the Philippines and also a lot of people (who usually have no experience of the process) posting negative comments about bringing money in here. I will say that it was all money I was prepared to lose and I wouldn’t suggest anyone does anything here unless it’s on that basis. That said, you can do it and do it well and make a little money if you do it right.

If anyone who is about to go through the process has any questions about potential fish hooks I’ll help as much as I can. I’m not saying I’m an expert but I’ll help if I can as I’ve just been through it.

If there is any interest I can post some photos of the property so you can see what we did with it. to title (one of the reasons I said to stay away from TD). If you take a Tax Dec property and buy it, then put it onto a new title that title can still be called into question by pretty much anyone. There are many cases of multiple people paying the BIR taxes on a particular piece of Tax Dec land then selling it to aI wasn't comfortable with buying newly foreclosed for the exact reason you highlight. Another important thing that I forgot to mention in my post relates to Tax Dec property that you plan to title (one of the reasons I said to stay away from TD). If you take a Tax Dec property and buy it, then put it onto a new title that title can still be called into question by pretty much anyone. There are many cases of multiple people paying the BIR taxes on a particular piece of Tax Dec land then selling it to an unwitting buyer. When these cases come to
court the buyer *usually* wins in the end but the costs of the court case and the time involved make it pretty risky.

For our next purchase we're probably going to buy a lot and build on it. Once again though, I'll make sure we're not the first holders of the title.  I was offered a foreclosed property when we were looking for this one. 5000 SQM of land with a basic local style house on it for less than a million. I reminded myself of two old adages. "That which is too good to be true usually is" and "a fool and his money are soon parted". When we're looking at prices of upward of 5000 pesos per sqm in most of this area I figured it wasn't worth the risk.I wasn't comfortable with buying newly foreclosed for the exact reason you highlight. Another important thing that I forgot to mention in my post relates to Tax Dec property that you plann unwitting buyer. When these cases come to court the buyer *usually* wins in the end but the costs of the court case and the time involved make it pretty risky.

[strap]

I've asked about this and searched around about this, and to me the risk seems quite high.

 

The basic law is that foreigners can't own land. So even if you buy the land in the Filipina spouse's name, things get real murky if she happens to die before you.

 

The inheritance laws are anything but clear. Someone may be able to quote some subsection of some that law that seems to clearly state that you (the foreigner) continue to have at least some rights to the property after she is gone. But there is probably some other subsection somewhere that says something different. So if things got nasty with the spouse's family, it could come down to some local judge rendering his wise, unbiased, uncorruptable opinion on the matter. That could, and probably would, end badly for the foreigner.

[chris49]

Full Member 10 posts 4 topics Skin: Glare 3.4.4 (Import) Local time: 12:06 PM Gender:Male Location:United States Country of Birth: Blood Type:No Listing Posted 46 minutes ago I've asked about this and searched around about this, and to me the risk seems quite high.

 

I agree. But I have lived rent free for 7 years, and if you factor that out over the longer term, the risk becomes more acceptable.