How much for land

[Possum]

I got quite an education building my first house here. I wasn't here full time for the first half of building. Contracted by a guy who claimed to be an architect as well as licensed by the municipality. He had nice photos of previous projects. After I was able to observe full time I decided to check him out further. Well, he was not registered with PCAB and had no business license but since we were so far along we stuck with him for a couple of more months. Bad decision. He abandoned the project, took all toilets, sinks etc with him.

We filed charges with PCAB. They found him guilty fined him for 5 years of operating without being certified or licensed. They also issued a cease and desist order forbidding him from further building. As far as we know he never paid the fine and we know for a fact he kept building. We sued and that has been going on for two years. A friend with NBI was going to charge him for continuing to build while having an open cease and desist order but found out someone with DILG was protecting him.

We're currently building another place but have hired a known registered architect, you can look up licensed builders on PCAB's website. The architect will only do the plans. We will supervise the building as well as hire the workers.

Hiring an unlicensed builder is risky as they have nothing to lose.

[Mike J]

4 hours ago, Dave Hounddriver said:

I even had one like that come back 11 months later to ask for his 13th month Christmas pay.

I once had the guy pumping gas ask me to pay double because it was the week before Christmas.  

[gbmmbg]

It funny, one of the local workers that does most of the work on our house is the 180 out from most of the local workers.. He over builds everything.

[hk blues]

17 minutes ago, gbmmbg said:

It funny, one of the local workers that does most of the work on our house is the 180 out from most of the local workers.. He over builds everything.

On one hand it's a positive but it can increase the build cost beyond what is really necessary if it impacts on materials.  Still, better safe than sorry here.

[Jollygoodfellow]

On 4/8/2022 at 6:48 AM, Mike J said:

And who knows if the taxes are current. 

From what I have read, that is the easy part to get up to date info on.

[jimeve]

On 4/11/2022 at 3:49 PM, Greglm said:

Hiring an unlicensed builder is risky as they have nothing to lose.

very surprised you managed to get a building permit!

[Possum]

6 hours ago, jimeve said:

very surprised you managed to get a building permit!

The guy had a business license at one time from the city even though he had no contractors license. The local officialdom either did not know or did not care that non-licensed individuals are not to be issued a license for a construction business.

[greggw2gs]

Great Advice!

[expatuk2014]

Your first place to visit is the city hall and see to who the land is registered to.

We have a friend in Batangas who was going to buy land to build on from a reative 

Turned out the land was owned by a company in Manila and was bought for warehousing !