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For example; mostly we finish the process of design, list of philippine home builders commercial  philippine home builders blueprints and permit before you arrive here because this takes 2 months... technical documents used by the builders for construction cebu home builders and they are also needed to get a building-permit

Philippine Construction Philippines; house builders philippines licensed home builders philippines homebuildersArchitects, Contractors, Home Builders, House Design Plan Philippine Architects interior design Philippines home builder Philippines. Our practice is to design your house to fit your lot, wishes and budget; so it realy becomes your dream-house... The first step in construction is the 'planning stage';

 

 

Cebu construction contractors

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 We offer a complete package from design to permits/paperwork to construction and interior design.


Three Easy Steps:

Step 1)
Most important is COMMUNICATION. It's YOUR house so please tell us all about your plans/wishes; location to build, when, how many storey, rooms, floor area, budget-range etc. so we can give you the best (FREE-) advice.

Step 2)
We inspect your lot;
a. verify location and orientation of your house with the morning sun (this effects design)
b. verify soil and neighbor-buildings
c. verify local government or subdivision's regulations/restrictions
d. verify logistics/accessibility
e. verify availability of building-materials and manpower
f. verify source of electricity/water
g. make pictures
h. make a short report of our findings
i. make a budgetary quote and recommendations

Step 3)
Just select from the following examples the features you like from any of the pictures and we mix it with your UNIQUE design that will fit your LOT, WISHES and BUDGET:


http://www.sibonga.com/philippine_house_pictures.htm



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In case you want to install a complete kitchen we can leave the kitchen out temporary until you arrive here in the Philippines to select one.


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Afraid of 'overpricing'? You want to know EXACT how many steel bars and sack of cement is used?
The solution is our 'Design-Supervision Package'; you pay a fixed amount (a percentage of the estimated total cost) to us to design- and manage/supervise your project. We design the house and we arrange all the paperwork, materials and labor BUT you are the one to pay those (not to us) during the construction. You don't have to be available all the time; you receive receipts for all materials and labor that have to be payed.
This 'Design-Supervision package' quarantees also that the project will be finished within the agreed time-frame.


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What is the cost of building a house in the Philippines?

It is wise to look around for the best- and most affordable contractor but remember that the more you squeeze your budget the more you lose on quality.
Some future-house-owners have to be educated too in the sense that they are sometimes not realistic in expecting super-service and quality while hiring the cheapest contractor...
You can probably force a (desperate-) contractor to go very low in price but do you realy think you are the winner..? Think again, he will use some tricks to keep his cost down to still make a profit and your house will look fine - for a short while only...so you will 'pay the price' lateron.

We advise anyone who realy wants to build a simple home and spend as little as possible for that to look for a non-licensed contractor (without office, no contract, not able to communicate by E-mail) because LICENSED contractors will most likely refuse to do the job for you.
The reason is simple; when you force a contractor to build a home in the cheapest way possible and with the cheapest materials then you definitely will experience problems within 1 year after building. And then the contractor is to blaim while the home-owner got exactly what he paid for...
To avoid this, licensed contractors refuse to build cheap inferior homes to avoid losing their good name and license.

The following prices are from LICENSED contractors; they keep up 'a certain level of quality'; if you want cheaper then you have to hire a non-licensed contractor.

The cost to build your house or commercial building depends on the exact location (city or province or island?), total floor area (make the house 2x bigger and the price will become 2x higher), the logistics/accessibility (is it possible to use a truck to bring the materials or do they have to be carried?), regulations/restrictions of the local government or subdivision ('they all have their own rules'), soil-type, site preparation (maybe backfill or retaining-wall?) neighbor-buildings (fire-wall?), availability of local skilled labor, source of electricity/water etc. plus you have to select what construction methods have to be used (hollow blocks or other) and what level of finishing you want (low-cost, average or high-class).

But to give some guidance:

A 100 sq mt (10m X 10m) one-level middle-class house near Metro Manila, Cebu or Davao will cost very very roughly on average between Php 1.6M and Php 2M.
This is mostly including: building-materials (doors, windows, roof, kitchen, paint, tiles etc.), labor, electrical/plumbing, equipment, tools, professional fees (management, supervision etc.), mobilization, demobilization, temporary facilities, transportation, waste-disposal, blue prints, bonds, insurances and other incidentals to complete the work.
Not including (this is mostly seperately priced-) are for example furniture, fixtures (chandelier, bathtub etc.), appliances (aircon, refrigerator etc.), landscaping, fence/gate, pool.
Your blue prints and construction-contract will contain all final details.

If you want a contractor to build far from the big cities than expect higher avarage costs; for the same example maybe between Php 2M and Php 2.5M.

Make the house 2x bigger and the price will be very roughly 2x higher.
You want solar panels? Vaulted ceilings? Insulation (two sheets glass) Windows? Ceramic Roof Tiles? Decorative stones on outside walls? Higher quality kichen and bathroom? Then you pay more.
A 100 sq mt one-level high-end, first class home might cost between Php 2.3M and Php 2.7M

Be Aware: if you want to build far away from the big cities then a local contractor can offer a lower cost estimate BUT they build with the old-style hollow blocks (PLUS local workers mostly just do not have the skills that 'city-laborers' have) while contractors who are located near the city will mostly be exposed to more projects and therefore have more experience and can offer better construction-methods. (but you pay more...)

Also take notice that ONLY Manila and Cebu have all the building-materials available that you need; outside those cities you have no choice other than to buy some materials in Cebu or Manila (higher cost).
HARDWARE STORES IN THE PROVINCES OFFER LIMITED QUALITY BUILDING MATERIALS AND ARE EXPENSIVE BECAUSE OF SCARCE SUPPLY.
In Boracay for example you might pay dubbel for cement...

TIP: A more realistic approach to determining the cost to build a house in the Philippines might be to simply work backwards. Start by determining how much you can afford to spend, then be realistic about the size of the house you need (every square meter counts!) and finally, decide what you can afford to build.


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Payment

Option 1: expect to pay 30% to 50% of the contract-amount CASH at contract signing.
The rest by 'progress billing' which means you pay every month as long as the construction is going on (about 5 months).
It is wise to buy ALL building materials at the start of construction; not every month little-by-little because prices will not likely go down PLUS you get a nice discount at the hardware store for buying in bulk.

Option 2: (only if you own a titled lot) 'Inhouse Financing'; pay 50% of the contract-amount CASH at contract signing; minimum Php 1M.
The rest over a period of maximum 5 years with approx. 1% interest per month.

Option 3: get a loan at any bank to finance the lot and/or construction.


To build apartments, subdivision, condominium or hotel etc.

(only if you own a titled lot) If you have a strong business plan with a strong exit strategy (you finished the feasibility- and market study) then we can discuss a Joint Venture or/and Funding.


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Hollow Block Construction

More than 50 Mistakes that can be made - and the Solution for those

In Philippines Construction probably 99% of all residential- and commercial buildings are made with hollow blocks. You only need sand and gravel from the nearest river, cement from the nearest factory and steel bars from the nearest hardware store. Ample available and thus the obvious choice to use for building.

First they form the columns (posts) by pouring concrete (sand + cement + gravel + water) between forms (mostly made out of plywood) where steel bars (reinforcement or 'rebar') are placed. When the concrete is dry enough, the forms are removed and what is left are 'steel-reinforced' concrete columns that can carry the next floors and the roof.
Note that the walls do not carry anything but their own (heavy) weight.

Between the columns they build up the walls out of hollow bricks by simply stacking- and glueing them together with mortar (sand + cement + water) and again reinforce with steel bars.
Note that the walls do not carry the next floor or the roof! The columns do that.

Building with hollow blocks is still the most affordable way of construction here and since they use it also for 20-storey buildings it have to be a good option obviously...but make sure that not only the contractor is experienced; the construction-workers are the one who do the work and that's where most problems occur.

Most hollow blocks are made literally in someones backyard as a family business where they have a few wooden forms in which they pour concrete to dry in the sun.
They should use a certain minimum amount of cement (expensive) to make a strong hollow block...
Then why is it that when you drop a hollow block on the floor it breaks in many pieces?
Are they using enough cement?
We have ways to make sure the hollow blocks are of better quality.

Hollow block walls have steel reinforcement bars inside; but the wall is still 'as strong as the weakest link', which is the hollow block, which is mostly 300 Pound per Square Inch.
So make sure the blocks are of good quality.
Any hollow block wall is 'victim of its own weight'; outside walls have to be 6 inch thick (according to the Philippine Building Code) often resulting in cracks at the window-corners when the workers do not exactly know how to avoid this.
The cracks let raining-water through that might even reach the steel bars in the wall and that means Rust.
The wall can maybe resist pressure but not uneven tension which occurs because of the high total weight plus weak hollow blocks between strong reinforced steel concrete.


Plastering or Rendering

Look around you here at the buildings; mostly the outside walls have cracks in the plaster; it almost seems normal.
Walls that are made with hollow blocks have to be covered with a seperate layer of a cement-sand mix (rendering or plaster) without steel bar reinforcement; it easily peels of or cracks when not enough cement is used. The cracks let raining-water through that might even reach the steel bars in the wall and that means Rust.

But even if they use the correct amount of cement, there are more problems that are not easy to control when the construction-crew is not educated; rapid evaporation, uneven shrinkage and lack of knowledge are only a few of those.
Rapid Evaporation: when the water from the concrete-mix evaporates too fast during the process of setting (hardening), it results in uneven shrinkage which gives cracks.
So the workers have to keep the complete wall surface wet to avoid quick evaporation BUT that's a lot of work...
The thicker the layer of plaster, the bigger the difference in evaporation (the outside part of the plaster loses water first) and the more chance of developing cracks.

Labor is relatively cheap here which is maybe the reason why not many Philippine contractors focus on improving construction technologies.

Plaster is labor-intensive and time-consuming, even redundant and unnecesary when you see the next technologies; you don't need hollow blocks nor plaster.

But for those who still prefer the hollow blocks; we identified more than 50 mistakes (and the solution for those-) that can be made. For example the mistake that workers add water to a concrete-mix that became dry while they have their lunch...not knowing that the chemicals in concrete have done their work and adding water doesn't change anything; it has lost its strength.
Our skilled workers are educated to avoid all the above mentioned problems by means of new insights in structural engineering plus we have the latest plaster-additives available to avoid cracks.

When building your house you can select cheap doors and windows because they can be replaced by better quality later BUT do not make the mistake to select an inferior 'bare structure' because that can not be replaced...


Two Alternative Construction Methods:

1) Panels of Light-Weight Concrete; Insulating
Cost: same or little higher than hollow blocks but Insulated (K-factor 0.2); keeps heat/noise outside, providing comfort and saving on aircon-bills.
No plaster = No cracks. Two times faster built. Walls hard as granite. Smooth flat surface.
The weight is only 25% of regular concrete; meaning the foundation does not have to carry so much weight and column-size can be reduced.
This light-weight building is perfect for steep hills or when there are soil- or foundation problems.
(Many American companies are using it to build their projects like callcenter in Cebu/Manila).
We do not sell the panels; we design/build as a complete service since skilled-experienced labor is necessary.
http://www.sibonga.com/philippines_concrete.htm


2) Solid Concrete Walls
Cost: same or little higher than hollow blocks but 10X stronger walls (3,000 PSI).
Typhoon and Earthquake resistant.
No plaster = No cracks. Two times faster built.
Columns and walls integrated as one system; walls also carry the next floor(s) and roof.
Weight is distributed evenly over the ground-floor unlike hollow-block-construction where the column-footing put pressure on a small space.
Ongoing reseach shows that walls can be made even thinner which will soon make this method (much-) cheaper than hollow block construction.
This 'reduced-weight' building system is also perfect for steep hills or when there are soil- or foundation problems.
The whole idea behind this is that most hollow-block buildings in the Philippines are at each point very massive and heavy while that is not always neccesary; look at an egg-shell, it is very strong but very thin...
We are the only contractor who offers this method in the Philippines; in the USA they use it for many years already in projects like the Trump Tower etc.
http://www.sibonga.com/cement_hollow_blocks_philippines.htm


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Value Engineering? What is it?

While other contractors only look at ways to cut cost by using cheaper materials, we also optimize the FUNCTION of all parts of your construction project. This is also known as 'Value Engineering'.
We remove unnecessary expenditures and find alternatives.

We do not 'cheapen' your building nor do we 'cut corners'.
We simply use knowledge which other Philippine contractors fail to recognize due to lack of information, shortage of time, rigid application of standards, reluctance to seek advice, habitual thinking, failure to admit ignorance, poor human relations, resistance to change or they make decisions based on feelings rather than facts.

The biggest savings are made in an EARLY stage of construction; design.
Home-owners and companies who want to build a commercial building tend to look only (too late-) at the construction- and maintenance stage to save on cost (materials and labor) but the highest impact on cost are found in the design-stage.
The philosophy behind this is that when we ask 'HOW' we are only looking for solutions but when we ask 'WHY' we are also looking for reasons.



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Construction takes on average 3 to 6 months but before that we need about 6 weeks for blue prints and building permit.

Ask for our 'extra service offer'; a laptop with wireless Internet and camera-connection (WEBCAM) at the construction-site to see for yourself how we progress.

Be advised that when you want a contractor to bid (quote) for your project, you need to show the blue prints. This is to avoid comparing apples with pears; every different design will have a different price.



We hope this general info answered your questions; if not then please tell us more about your plans/wishes; location to build, when, how many storey, rooms, floor area, budget-range etc. so we can give you the best (FREE-) advice.

 

 

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FREE advice about construction in the Philippines Cebu home   builders construction companies Philippines homebuilder We share with you our experience and 'know-how'.
 

From small renovations to high-rise commercial buildings. As a Network we have a local Filipino architects or Cebu contractors in your r choice between hollow-blocks or the BOX-system 3D Design; home builders in the philippines constructors.

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