Raindrops are falling on my head - in bed! Belgian complains about shoddy new Pattaya house

[Surasak]

Some very negative people commenting, is it jealousy I wonder?

 

When I first saw the basic structure of our house, I was somewhat worried but then the finished building is something well worth the wait to move into. Eleven years and still looks as good as the day it was completed.

[Tropposurfer]

6 hours ago, asiaexpat said:

Never buy a building unless you  supervise the construction. Subcontractors take liberties with materials and workmanship than disappear. Watch every step if you intend to buy. 

Right on

OR get a damned good trustworthy builder to do so far you!

[JimSaints]

Well, you see how they drive, teach, run the country etc etc etc and you think they can build you a good house …

[moe666]

3 hours ago, giddyup said:

Not necessarily, could be in company name. Besides, not every relationship in Thailand is a disaster. I bought a house in my partners name 9 years ago, we're still going strong.

Many people are losers and always compareing others to themselves

[kensisaket]

4 hours ago, Vacuum said:

I can agree with this. But I think most buyers don't have any experience with construction or house building, what can they supervise?

You don't need construction experience to look up when the roof is going on to see if you can see daylight thru the roofing material.  

[jvs]

7 hours ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Sorry, but I have zero sympathy for any farang that buys property in LOS. The problems are well known and have been for many, many years. One only has to have a read of TVF to see what has happened in the past.

I can only surmise that the people that bought those houses did no inspections during building and didn't even have a look in the roof space before shelling out millions.

Caveat emptor, and even more so in LOS, the land of shoddy workmanship.

Are you saying you never bought property here?

[Stevemercer]

This is a picture of the hole in our ceiling, plus the roof. However, it wasn't caused by rain, but by me falling through the roof while fixing a small leak! Fall of 2 metres to the ceiling and then another 3 metres to the floor. Luckily I don't remember anything.

 

We have since had someone fix the roof (2000 Baht including materials), ceiling (1000 Baht) as well as the leak I was walking across the roof to fix (300 Baht).

 

Total hospital bill for me was 40,000 Baht (of which 25,000 Baht was paid for by insurance).

 

[thaibeachlovers]

5 hours ago, petermik said:

I had this built 4 years ago down near Krabi (2 bed 2 baht 120sq. metres)....local builder to my specs....excellent workmanship at a total cost of 1.3 million baht (400,000 baht labour 900,000 materials excluding aircon) absolutely no problems....not ALL builders here are cowboys

Seriously, I'm happy you got a good deal.

Unfortunately, every local I ever employed to do anything was incompetent and shoddy. The "electrician" I employed to put in a shower heater thought a 1 foot rod was an actual earth!!!!!!!!!!

The welder made do with sunglasses, and refused to use my proper arc welding eye shield. Needless to say his welding was not good. The hinge he put on the gate fell off, because he hadn't cleaned the dirt under it before welding.

My solution was to do everything myself, but not everyone can do plumbing, welding, electrical wiring and circuit breakers etc.

The house my wife and I lived in was rubbish, but at least the roof didn't leak; at least till a palm branch blocked the roof guttering and water came through the kitchen ceiling. I couldn't fix that, because they had used that weak cement type roofing, and I would have fallen through it. My wife was too scared to go up on it as afraid of heights, so just had to put up with water when it rained. 

When my in laws had a flat built under the house because the MIL couldn't climb stairs was a disaster. They could have asked me for advice but they knew it all. At least they did ask me to do the wiring, so that was done properly, but when I was away they got the local guy to put an outside light on the wall, and he managed to melt all the wire, light fixture and switch. Direct earth from the power pole!

Imagine my surprise when I was clearing away some rubbish in the car port, and almost died because I uncovered one of those knife type mains switches with no cover, and wired directly to the power pole. Had I touched the live terminal, TVF would have had a lot less contributions from me.

It's my OPINION, that many Thai workers have little training or understanding of what they do, and do poor work because of it. If an "electrician" has never studied electricity, they probably think that a 1 foot rod is a sufficient earth, but people die in showers because they ain't earthed properly in LOS.

[david555]

21 minutes ago, Stevemercer said:

This is a picture of the hole in our ceiling, plus the roof. However, it wasn't caused by rain, but by me falling through the roof while fixing a small leak! Fall of 2 metres to the ceiling and then another 3 metres to the floor. Luckily I don't remember anything.

 

We have since had someone fix the roof (2000 Baht including materials), ceiling (1000 Baht) as well as the leak I was walking across the roof to fix (300 Baht).

 

Total hospital bill for me was 40,000 Baht (of which 25,000 Baht was paid for by insurance).

 

So you tried to economize and cost you hospital /insurance …. probably a Thai repair man would know where to step on those thin roofs....lucky you survived 

just like hey know how to drive motorbikes in this crazy town  traffic 

[thaibeachlovers]

10 minutes ago, jvs said:

Are you saying you never bought property here?

I never bought property in Thailand. Never felt the need to. My wife did hint how she'd like a small house built on her land, but I resisted the temptation to build it for her.

Far as fridges, washing machines etc go, yes I bought those, because she couldn't afford to, and I benefited from having them. 

Before we got married we stayed in a rented apartment, during the marriage we stayed in the family's property, and after the marriage I lived in hotels.

Renting is so cheap, that I can't understand why any farang would buy. Certainly solves any problems brought about by a rock grinding plant or an all night karaoke opening next door.

[thaibeachlovers]

1 hour ago, Tropposurfer said:

Right on

OR get a damned good trustworthy builder to do so far you!

Given that even in western countries people get conned by cowboy builders, how are we supposed to know who is a good builder in LOS, other than by word of mouth from someone had something built?

[jvs]

3 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

I never bought property in Thailand. Never felt the need to. My wife did hint how she'd like a small house built on her land, but I resisted the temptation to build it for her.

Far as fridges, washing machines etc go, yes I bought those, because she couldn't afford to, and I benefited from having them. 

Before we got married we stayed in a rented apartment, during the marriage we stayed in the family's property, and after the marriage I lived in hotels.

Renting is so cheap, that I can't understand why any farang would buy. Certainly solves any problems brought about by a rock grinding plant or an all night karaoke opening next door.

Sorry my bad ,i thought i remembered you talking about buying beach property down south but that is awhile ago.

 

[chilli42]

No sympathy?  Told you so?  Should have done this and that during construction.  How helpful. Naive and ripped off.  I do feel bad for the guy and his Thai neighbours.

 

My wife has been a property developer for 25 years.  They only way you are going to catch shoddy off spec work is to be there every day being certain to check each step vs the BOQ.  They need to put in a concerted effort to find the developer and get him/her into court.  They likely will need to find a PI to do it for them but shared as a group should not be too expensive. If/when they find the developer the court process will be years unfolding.  If roof leaks are the only problem they are lucky.  The owners will likely need to replace.  Finally, sell the property as soon as repairs are complete ... that property is an accident waiting to happen.

 

As an aside.  I have been in Thailand 29 years and I still can’t figure out why people go to the Police for every single problem.   My wife tells me it’s because people don’t know who else to go to - maybe.  It should be obvious to everyone that the Police will do nothing. 

 

 

[JulesMad]

10 hours ago, Jonathan Fairfield said:

he bought a new house

THAT is exactly the problem; now it is your house AND your problem. Who do you want to complain to?!?

[bristolgeoff]

Good luck in finding the builder and getting it repaired or money to fix it.they have all dissappeared  and next time you watch them like a hawk when Thais do build your next house

[thaibeachlovers]

2 hours ago, jvs said:

Sorry my bad ,i thought i remembered you talking about buying beach property down south but that is awhile ago.

 

Someone else, I think. I never bought property anywhere in Thailand, and never lived in South Thailand. The only place I'd ever want to live in South Thailand would be at Haad Khom or Than Sadet, and none of the places there would be for sale.

[thaibeachlovers]

1 hour ago, chilli42 said:

No sympathy?  Told you so?  Should have done this and that during construction.  How helpful. Naive and ripped off.  I do feel bad for the guy and his Thai neighbours.

Actually, I do feel bad for them. I feel sorry that they got scammed (I've been scammed enough to feel sorry for anyone else that suffered that ), but I have no sympathy because they should have done some research  before shelling out over 2 million baht.

It doesn't take much research to find out that there are a lot of shoddy builders in LOS.

It's not like shoddy builders are a recent phenomenon.

[stuandjulie]

Not wishing to be smug but the thing about poor resale didn't work in my case, I paid for a house in 2005, 2.5m @ 73 Baht to the £ and sold it 13 years later for 8.9m @ 45 to the £ so it can pay if you are lucky I guess.

[bust]

9 hours ago, petermik said:

I had this built 4 years ago down near Krabi (2 bed 2 baht 120sq. metres)....local builder to my specs....excellent workmanship at a total cost of 1.3 million baht (400,000 baht labour 900,000 materials excluding aircon) absolutely no problems....not ALL builders here are cowboys

2 beds for 2 baht? What a bargain ????

[GoodieAfterDark]

10 hours ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Sorry, but I have zero sympathy for any farang that buys property in LOS. The problems are well known and have been for many, many years. One only has to have a read of TVF to see what has happened in the past.

I can only surmise that the people that bought those houses did no inspections during building and didn't even have a look in the roof space before shelling out millions.

Caveat emptor, and even more so in LOS, the land of shoddy workmanship.

This happens all over the world where there is no home inspection. Even with home inspection there is no guarantee that you are getting what you paid for. 

[monkeycu]

4 hours ago, Stevemercer said:

This is a picture of the hole in our ceiling, plus the roof. However, it wasn't caused by rain, but by me falling through the roof while fixing a small leak! Fall of 2 metres to the ceiling and then another 3 metres to the floor. Luckily I don't remember anything.

 

We have since had someone fix the roof (2000 Baht including materials), ceiling (1000 Baht) as well as the leak I was walking across the roof to fix (300 Baht).

 

Total hospital bill for me was 40,000 Baht (of which 25,000 Baht was paid for by insurance).

 

When you stuff up you really do a top job 

[DJ54]

Wife sister had a new tin room on her village home. She said she needs to have silicone put on the nails....told her call them you 

paid for a roof that’s not going to leak. Tell them fix it don’t pay anything 

[Caine]

wouldn’t buy a box of matches in Thailand, let alone a house.

[Seth1a2a]

A few years ago a Thai friend invited me to see his new 3bdr 3.5bath townhouse to evaluate a few concerns. It was in a  gated community with all the amenities etc.... The upper level wallboard had seam cracks wide enough to see outside.  The bottom level track lighting for the kitchen did not work because the wiring was flooded as a result of the upstairs bathroom drain being clogged (brown water stains on the ceiling was the clue) I persuaded him to call the maintenance manager over since they were now responsible for repairs to the unit. They cut open the drain pipe to reveal the tile layers had unsuccessfully tried to get rid of their excess work materials by using the drain. It had simply hardened inside the pipe. (I guess running  water to clear the drain would have ruined their tile installation so they  conveniently forgot about it . )

 Also, about one year later all owners ended up suing  because the retaining wall surrounding the compound was beginning to crack and lean. Eventually all concerns were remedied through maintenance and not the builder.

 

The key point is that the building contractor had signed off responsibility for repairs to the maintenance staff. This essentially gives the contractor the freedom to repeat the same unaccountable errors over and over again on newer contracts.

 

Slightly off topic but the upside to his purchase of the unit was the increase in market value over a short amount of time.  Looking up that property for this post, I noticed prices had gone up significantly in the last 2 years.   He paid about 8,000,000.00 baht compared to units in the same compound that are now being listed as high as 11,900,000 baht.  .........It turned out to be well worth the inconvenience in the long run. Others have not been as lucky as he was.

 

If you do buy then please thoroughly pre-check your purchase .

If you build then you should  "be there"  from time to time while they " do that "  to insure against obvious attempts to cut corners or cover up any potentially catastrophic blunders.

 

 

 

[JIMMY56]

I have similar problems in my home, insurance has been paid ( to the builder ) yes the builder has his own insurance policies, yet they will not come and do the repairs, what can you do

[wisperone]

16 hours ago, Bob12345 said:

That said, it is smart to hire someone to do a complete check before buying. We did the same, the guy took 4 hours and inspected everything. We got a complete list with descriptions and pictures and the contractor fixed every single point. It also helps to buy from a reputable construction company instead of some unknown limited partnership that is dissolved as soon as the last house is done.

It's the things that one cannot see when construction is completed that can come back to bite you.

[hotchilli]

19 hours ago, monkeycu said:

Put in a ladder and you have an attic 

Line it with plastic you'll have a roof-top pool, kick-off a few tiles  a pool with a view!

Then advertise it & sell it quick!

[wisperone]

Remember several weeks ago there was a story about a roof caving in/collapsing...killing at least one of the family members.  My suggestion to the Belgian owner, get out while you are still alive.

[mikebell]

17 hours ago, giddyup said:

Not necessarily, could be in company name. Besides, not every relationship in Thailand is a disaster. I bought a house in my partners name 9 years ago, we're still going strong.

I got caught in the Company house scam.  I was married for over ten years only to find my wife had had me sign a Thai document giving her 50%.  This document was drawn up by the Audit company who did the annual tax returns.  The changes took place two years after the marriage, I found out later.  We had been living a lie for over eight years.

[inThailand]

Shoddy workmanship here? Surprise, Surprise says Gomer Pyle.