$60k modern home build during this inflation. Did we stay on budget for the rest of the build???

hello everyone hi guys uh you're about to watch our house tour video uh but before you do we would like uh to thank you guys for all your support over the last year uh our Channel building the Philippines is just a year old uh in fact it's not even a year old we started our Channel at the end of July of last year July 27th July 27th so it's not even a year old yet so I just like to thank everybody for uh subscribing and watching our videos so the first two years here and we've been in the Philippines now for two years uh our two-year anniversaries coming up uh next week and it's been a roller coaster ride for sure uh we uh arrived in Manila had to quarantine because we arrived in the middle of the pandemic for 10 days and then we were off to Leyte where Wilma's family was so we got a chance to visit then we had a lot of things to do we had to arrange our banking uh we had to buy a scooter we bought a truck uh you know and started to uh settle in and then we went on our quest to find land uh and it was uh it was work it took us almost a year 11 months uh to find this piece of property so we took our time went all over leighty and most of you know the story then we branched out to Cebu then we went to behold and then a little island off of a hole named pangolo Island and then eventually to Negros Oriental so we did get a chance to see uh five islands and we lived out of a suitcase for a while uh and you know it was just uh what we wanted to do we wanted to take our time uh to find property uh where we could build our dream house and we found it here in Darwin Negros Oriental so the first year was really just our sir search for land then the second year a little less than a year was all about building that's why we named our Channel building the Philippines so it was all about buying this piece of property and then of course attorneys and getting it titled indeed a sale and navigating all through that and that was an education for Wilma and I as well and then we had to meet with Architects uh and contractors and design the home and most of you know the story but there may be a lot of you here that are new uh to our Channel and don't know the back story so the first two years we've been very very busy but we're just getting started guys we're very very excited we are relaxing a little bit because we've been so busy uh again for two years now we've been on the go uh doing this doing that and finally have what we think is a dream home home here in Darwin so I hope you enjoy the video our channel is going to take some twists and turns we hope that you uh watch this home tour and then decide to subscribe we do appreciate if you would hit the like button for this video because it's a little different video and we really appreciate your support in hitting the like button and then if you could also share this video because it's considered one of our premium videos uh share it on your like Facebook page with your friends and that's a real good way of getting our video in front of people that never seen us before and then they can consider subscribing so again if you're not subscribed we would ask you to do so and we really hope you enjoy our house tour video we are building the Philippines Welcome to our home foreign [Music] so uh long-awaited costing video uh looking forward to bringing it to you guys but first I want to personally thank Alex Kosh uh he has his own YouTube channel you guys should check it out uh for helping us with this video so the big question is uh why are we doing a costing video [Laughter] we're doing this to help you guys out when we started this channel uh jeez it's got to be eight months ago maybe even nine months ago when we first bought the property and if you guys remember for the long time viewers um it was all about uh documenting our journey of building our retirement home here in Darwin that gross Oriental uh and uh we really wanted to document it for ourselves for our family and our friends uh and the channel grew much larger than we thought now we're still a relatively small Channel very small uh we're a small Channel but nonetheless we're very very happy and surprised how you guys have accepted us and there's a lot of conversation back and forth we get a lot of comments a lot of emails a lot of Facebook Messengers from what we call kind of a coined phrase the 10 percenters right we are one of the ten percenters and really what that means is you know two people in a long-term relationship who wants to move to the Philippines and build their own dream home a lot of people here uh rent and that's fantastic there's nothing wrong with that but a smaller majority uh wants to buy property and build their own own home and that's what we did several months ago so we wanted to be able to help you guys make some decisions because no one looks out for your retirement dollars more than yourself isn't that true that is true and we have a budget and we have to be careful with the money that we have so our total budget was 150 000 U.S U.S dollar so that was our budget that we're starting off with and our goal was to achieve that and not go over so through this video we're going to talk to you about where we spent our money and then at the end what was our total spend so we very much love this house very much it's our design it's ours this is our design home we love the area we love the people here and it's been a journey for sure so has it been perfect of course not there has been uh stressful days and that is another thing that we want to make sure that you guys understand when you think about buying land and building a house you know all the ups and downs the good times the bad times you know the stress that you will feel but it's definitely doable and you can overcome it if you take your time and do the right thing so the next question is who should build a home here in the Philippines now this is my advice so don't listen to me but I think it really should be someone who's married who's in a committed relationship because as everybody knows a foreigner cannot own land in the Philippines and you do hear of some stories where that does go bad so that would be the first thing is to be very very cautious of where you build and the fact that you understand that the title of the home of the property will be in hopefully your wife's name and just not your girlfriend so that would be the first advice but we want to go ahead and give you guys a real good in-depth look at our home and what things cost so stay tuned all right guys so uh I have my notes and I will go ahead and start going through uh the costing of each item so first up is the land the land right so uh obviously you have to have a piece of land before you can build uh so like I said before we think we did really good you guys have seen the views of this property uh we really love it it has a good source of water good source of electricity uh so we feel like we really found a gem it took only seven months for the title to transfer into Wilma's name so you know that's always something that you have to consider that it's not going to be delayed for uh for any reasons so the land was ready to be built upon and everything went very very smooth so uh we bought this property for 1.8 million pesos which is 32 727 US Dollars now let me explain a little bit about the conversion obviously over the course of the eighth month of build we would transfer money over a little at a time so the first chunk that we sent over from the U.S was 52 pesos to the American dollar but then another large chunk was at 56 and then we did the last uh chunk of money at 59. so I'm using an average of 55. 55 55 pesos to American dollar because that's about the average that we transferred over now we budgeted at 50. so we were very lucky that the dollar was strong during the time that we actually was transferring money over so just so you guys know we use 55 pesos to the American dollar but remember the ultimate goal was for us to build this home from beginning to end for 150 000 US dollars that was the ultimate goal so the property itself was 1.8 million now when it comes to titling the land and the lawyer fees and all the capital gain tax all that we group together so the lawyer all the taxes getting it titled everything was a hundred and forty four thousand pesos or two thousand six hundred and eighteen dollars that was all in we did nothing we allow our attorney to do everything yes uh even uh taking care of the bir or standing in line to to process the paperwork uh we hired him and his team to do that for us so that was included in that cost of 144 000 pesos so the entire land was about 36 000 to get it completely uh title so then you have to find an architect and you guys know that we uh interviewed uh three Architects and we think we really found a great architect and again we wanted him to handle everything so uh not only did he Design This Home uh got it to blueprint he handled all the permits all the permits all filling out the paperwork going back and forth uh to the municipal uh dealing with all the different uh costs with that entails with that he took care of our water hookup uh he took care of our electrical hookup and all the fees and different things that needs to be done so he handled everything for us uh he charged uh 80 000 pesos or one thousand four hundred and fifty four dollars so that's not bad so now we got to the point of building the home itself and here's I think you guys are going to see that we did very very well so the house itself and you guys have seen it many many times it's a modern style home it has 12 foot ceilings in the main area 10 foot ceilings it's a three bedroom two bath you know we think the house is just fantastic to contractor did a fantastic job we paid 3.3 million pesos for the home or the home um and that is 60 000 US Dollars uh to me that's staggering uh because you could never do that in the U.S for that price so the house 3.3 million pesos so now on to the pool our pool is five meters by 10 meters four foot deep by six foot deep now if you measure the pool uh because of uh the layers of concrete and the tiling is actually 4.75 meters by 9.75 meters just to be exact and then it has the water feature and it's fully tiled the walls of the pool is tiled the floor is tiled uh the steps itself is all tiled so completely tiled which is added cost for that we paid 800 000 pesos for the pool or 14 545 dollars uh the fence gotta have a fence in the Philippines so as you guys know uh defense is seven foot high on the sides 10 foot high in the back and then you know the front has the metal going across with the gate so the entire fence was 800 000 pesos same as the pool yes um and that was fourteen thousand five hundred and forty five dollars uh we thought it was important uh to have a fence uh most people who build homes here do have fences around their property and uh you know we just wanted that ad in security we didn't want it to be too high on the sides or in the front that's why we have the metal uh part of the fence in the front so you can see through and we didn't want to obstruct any views and then for visitors we didn't want to have where we can't see a visitors coming up to the gate so that's why we have that uh the way it is in the front so uh we're glad that we did it now there was a lot of rocks on the property a lot of rocks a lot of rocks so we uh this was unbudgeted so we needed to bring in a very large excavator to do a lot of the uh moving of the Rocks you know we built that very large rock wall dug the pool dug the foundation for the house dug the trench for the fence that cost us because the contractor did pay for part of it because I saved him labor from having to dig the pool for example so he did pay part of the excavation but our cost was a 165 000 pesos or three thousand dollars for excavation and that wasn't budgeted no uh so that was an added cost so I think it's important at this point of this conversation to say um I've been in business for 30 years I ran distribution centers all over the country and I always made my own budgets and I had to stick to the budget very very important for a company that you represent that you make budget so as you guys know our budget was 150 000 so we were not gonna go over um it just wasn't going to happen I wasn't going to allow it to go uh over budget so whenever there was an increase in something something else decreased yes that's just the way it is Wilma was fine with that so if we went over three thousand dollars in excavation we needed to find that three thousand dollars somewhere else we didn't uh just say we'll just go over budget and we'll just spend 153 000 on a house um it's kind of a a game with me so to speak uh but I wanted to stick uh to our budget for various reasons so unfortunately that was not budgeted but it was necessary and we glad we did it because we were able to uh really uh accelerate the landscaping and there was just a lot of rocks in the way there's too many yeah there was just a lot of rocks so that is the the main build now there was two different categories uh the contract extras the contractor extras and then our costs for the things that we did that wasn't part of the original contract so we had a contract drawn up with the contractor for the house the fence in the pool um and we did go over on a couple of things so the way it worked and I also want to say the contractor that we used was very easy to work with when we came up and said hey we want to change this we want to change that there was certain items that he said I can absorb that I'm okay with that but then there was certain items where he came back and said now that's going to be too much money um you know you need to pay if you want to do that particular item you're going to have to pay for that and we were fine with that because we were under contract so the next two categories is things that we had the contractor do for us that was an added cost above and beyond the contract uh and I was so comfortable with him it was a handshake and it worked out fine and then the lot of the specifics here in my my notes is the things that we did so we'll get into that so the contractor extras was a hundred and sixty thousand pesos above our contract uh that was two thousand nine hundred and nine dollars and this is what entailed in that hundred and sixty thousand pesos you guys know that we did a solid driveway so we had to pay extra for that our dirty kitchen wall uh was originally supposed to be eight feet high according to plan and we went 10 feet high so obviously that additional two feet we had to pay for then you guys also remember uh we decided late to build a wall on the one side of our dirty kitchen so that was uh all that uh Concrete in the hollow block and the steel and the window that's there uh that was an extra uh the patio around the pool uh not the two meter overhang but the actual concrete around the pool uh that was extra uh the the carport concrete uh you guys remember the ceiling in the utility room something that Wilma wanted because it looked like the carport was just a steal she wanted to enclose that in so that was an extra the water feature of the pool wasn't part of the original blueprint so that water feature um and then the seven uh electrified lights on the columns in front of the house and all the electric that runs down the driveway to Electrify those lights that wasn't part of the electrical plan so we had to pay for that so all that together was a hundred and sixty thousand pesos so now everything else everything else wow appliances slash everything yeah furniture and all that so the reason why we're getting to this much detail is we're trying to help you guys understand because obviously if you build a house in the Philippines and you're coming from another country you need Furniture right so that's an expense so we figured we'd just share uh what we paid so if we group everything together uh we paid 542 000 pesos or nine thousand eight hundred and fifty four dollars a lot of money uh for everything else but this what was included in the everything else our generator we wanted a generator not every house here has a generator we wanted a generator for brownouts our refrigerator our stove our couch uh four air cons in the house uh that we never use but we wanted to have uh four air cons one in the main living room one in the master bedroom within each of the two spare uh bedrooms so four air cons uh television our Transformer which was a big boss a big cost of that we were surprised how much a Transformer cost we paid 87 000 pesos just for the Transformer uh but it does give real clean steady power at 220 into the house with no surges so it's well worth it um our walk-in closet yeah was it was an extra uh then of course the china cabinet the buffet uh the stools that you see right behind us and then all the Landscaping all the Rocks the many many loads of rocks uh all the plants um and the labor remember Janelle did all our landscaping and we paid his salary for many many uh months so all that uh grouped together was uh 542 000 pesos so you total it all up here's the grand total don't know if you guys were taking notes or not uh we built everything everything that I just said soup the nuts was 141 652 dollars or 8 348 under budget yes yes we were under budget we were under budget so what that means to mean the business world I get a very big bonus at the end of the year that's how it works uh so we did come under budget and uh if you translate that to uh pesos uh it's just under 7.8 million pesos 7.791 so call it 7.8 million pesos so we built our dream home here in Negros Oriental in Darwin beautiful view uh we love the area it's very quiet up here there's going to be a lot a lot of nice neighbors eventually in a subdivision uh the house is plenty big for us 168 square meters plenty big three bedrooms two bath a beautiful swimming pool that's just a couple of meters from the house you you've guys seen it many many times for under 7.8 million pesos so that is the specifics um we're very glad to bring that to you and for all our friends and all the viewers out there who are thinking about uh building a home in the Philippines you can do it you have to use caution and I think we can do some subsequent uh videos about that how to be cautious because there is challenges and you do hear of stories where people uh overrun their budget have issues and it's you know very hard to hear we have several friends and we're hearing about them right now that they're in the middle of a build and having issues and we were lucky we picked the right attorney we picked the right architect and we pick the right contractor we got very very lucky um we think part of that is our interviewing skills the fact that we interviewed three to four for each category we did some due diligence but even then uh there can be issues um but we were very lucky with the people we chose yes you know part of uh you know doing a good job or leadership is surrounding yourself with good people um and we've done that and we've also surrounded herself with some really good friends and we've settled in here nicely so we hope that uh this video will help you give you a little better understanding of how much things cost here in 2022 2023 as we built over those two years we were happy to bring you this information if you have any specific questions which you already do we get a lot of comments a lot of emails but if you guys want any contact information or any special specific questions probably best to email us email right email us at buildingthephilippines gmail.com and we'll do our best uh to give you guys the answer now again we're not the experts uh you can say that you know part of this build was luck um I think the timing was good we got in here like I said earlier right before they opened up uh to uh foreigners we came in on a ballot Bion Visa so before Taurus was allowed here so I think we caught the beginning of uh when the cost starting to go up yes but I think if we built this house today A year later it probably would cost more uh than what we paid because we were right on that cusp and then someone that built five years ago would tell us the same story that they built cheaper five years ago so prices are not going down no it just kept going up especially for the price of price okay guys I have several questions for you how did you end up in the Philippines well I come from the Philippines um actually I came from a lady that's my that's where I was born and raised yeah when we uh first got together as a couple and then we were married in the U.S uh Wilma always said you need to come to the Philippines and visit and obviously I wanted to meet her family so our first trip I believe was 2004. we came to the Philippines and we really had a great time yes I really fell in love with the Philippines and then over the next several years about every four years we would come visit now you guys know the longtime viewers that Wilma built a dream house for her parents she lived and worked in the U.S and sacrificed and sent money home for her parents to buy land and to build their own dream home so we had a master bedroom a bath and a little porch area for us and the plan was the original plan was for us to stay day in the U.S and just travel back and forth say every four years and just visit and we typically would stay about three weeks three weeks into four weeks yes yeah about three to four weeks at a time uh but then I think it was my fourth trip uh to the Philippines and we got back to the U.S and a lot of the longtime viewers already know this uh you know know their story uh but basically I said to Wilma and I think it was around 2012. I said to Wilma would you like to retire in the Philippines because I think I would like to move there and then that's when we put together our 10-year plan yes we had a 10-year plan to save money and to work towards uh retiring early now I happen to be 45 at that time so that put me at 55 years old to retire early so that is uh early but that was our plan that was the plan and we decided I did to uh to move here and because of the pandemic we made the 10-year plan a nine-year plan and uh we gotta we got out of Dodge one year early uh and we're glad we did because as you'll find out with this uh costing video uh we believe we saved money uh because we got here before tourism opened up and we knew that there wasn't a lot of real estate being bought and sold during the pandemic so part of our plan was to get here as early as possible because we knew once tourism opened up that a lot of foreigners would rush in here that wasn't here for two to three years and start buying up land and building homes so we wanted to get on the very front end of that so that was very strategic on our part and I think it saved us a lot of money saved us a lot of money with the materials and the cost of the property yeah absolutely so that's the answer yeah I can only say that a year ago I came here and it was hardly to meet any foreigners on the street yeah really hard but now you just go on a bully work and you can meet me meet later I don't know 100 in one day so yeah absolutely the amount of foreigners that are here today is compared to a year two years ago is much different so I was a very strategic move uh on our end yeah uh do you have guys in your jets do we have any regrets no no regrets no regrets um the answer for me is no um is there's always opportunities for things to be better of course uh but do we have any regrets as husband and wife retiring early to a tropical island uh building our own home the way we wanted it built and enjoy the back half of our life no regrets at all yeah it's good yeah uh what advice do you have for your foreigners thinking about to build a house in the Philippines yeah that's that's a good question um you guys know you know one of the main reasons for us to have this channel uh was to document our Dream Home build for us and for our family and friends but quickly we understood once more and more people started subscribing and watching our channel that we could be a resource to help of course we don't have all the answers we're not experts by any stretch of imagination but we felt that we could at least assist some people and that's what has happened yes I coined that phrase the 10 percenters and we've had a lot of very nice couples visit our site some great conversations and basically all of them has either bought land this area and is getting ready to build or they're thinking about buying property they're not exactly sure if this greater Dumaguete area is going to be the area that they want to settle but they wanted to check it out so uh you know a big part of our channel is to kind of show you guys that you can do it and you can do it within a budget and do your best to uh you know save as much money as possible yeah what does your future hold for you guys our future our future is looking up for sure um now that we have settled in um and the house is complete now it's time to start really uh enjoying our retirement so we've been here and you guys know most of you that about two years we're coming up on our two-year anniversary next month next month yes here in the Philippines and we've been on the go on the go for two years the first year was traveling and trying to find property we went to five different islands and we decided to to build our home here in Negros Oriental uh in the greater Dumaguete area so we were very busy living out of a suitcase and trying to find land which it seems like we were looking at land uh basically every other day and then this next year has been building this home and we've been very very uh involved in this build uh making sure we are here every day we moved into this home on day 184 um so just a little over six months now I wasn't 100 completed but it was move-in ready uh day 184 and we were here on site 181 days out of 184. so that shows a commitment that we wanted to make sure that we were very involved in this home build and that would be probably a very good recommendation to make do your best if you're going to build a home in the Philippines just because things are different here try to be on site as much as possible yeah yeah and you can know each detail from your house you know what can go wrong what you need to do yeah having that tribal knowledge of uh being here and we watched our home be built so it wasn't just about uh checking for Quality it was just to be here and experience it and we're glad that we put that investment in because we know every inch of the this property and we know how well this house was built and it just feels good it's ours I have one more question you guys for you what makes you 50. each other having each other that's a good that's a good answer I I can't improve on that nah it's true uh and I think I said this on other videos uh this means nothing really we have a great view beautiful pool beautiful house we really do love the house that we built but it really means nothing without my wife means nothing it's brick and mortar as they say so uh you know to share the back half of our life together and the fact that we're in a committed relationship we've been married for many many years again none of this means anything without sharing it with my wife so you answered that very fast yes it's great that was that was a fast answer but yeah absolutely true so uh I appreciate the five questions yeah thank you for answering my questions thank you for having me here thank you Alex thank you guys for watching too see you

Channel: Building the Philippines with Wilma & Greg

Views: 355,509

Keywords: philippines, dauin, dumaguete, home build, dream home build, filipina, married to a filipina, living in the philippines, visa, travel, travel vlog, moving to the philippines, retirement, retiring to asia, retiring to thailand, visiting thailand, visiting asia, how to save money, building on a budget, cost to build, budget building, money matters, cost to build in the philippines, gardening, landscaping, building, manila, cebu, luzon, palawan, boracay, vietnam, japan, china, singapore, malaysia

Id: -uN_WWsYYGg

Length: 35min 41sec (2141 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 02 2023