My apartment building project in Saigon, Vietnam

Hey Ben, if you don't mind me asking; how much do you have to in free cash to start this project?

Don't want to be picky - you didn't buy any land, you leased it.

You didn't describe what you mean as 'building' - are you just hiring someone to do it or are you acting as your own main contractor.

Don't trust 'plumbers' or 'electricians'. Few exist in this country. And does your area ever flood? Yes? Well fir anti-backflow valves on the sewer line and make sure the sewer drop on the house and to the road sewer is around 7" in diameter.

And install a 'Chinese' roof, it will save you millions (of Dong) every year.

And the old maxim, Location, Location, Location doesn't apply in VietNam.

LaxFogo wrote:

Hey Ben, if you don't mind me asking; how much do you have to in free cash to start this project?

Hi there, that's an unusual question. Would you mind sharing why you're curious about this little tidbit of information?

Jaitch wrote:

Don't want to be picky - you didn't buy any land, you leased it.

You didn't describe what you mean as 'building' - are you just hiring someone to do it or are you acting as your own main contractor.

Don't trust 'plumbers' or 'electricians'. Few exist in this country. And does your area ever flood? Yes? Well fir anti-backflow valves on the sewer line and make sure the sewer drop on the house and to the road sewer is around 7" in diameter.

And install a 'Chinese' roof, it will save you millions (of Dong) every year.

And the old maxim, Location, Location, Location doesn't apply in VietNam.

Hi Jaitch, thanks for your advise. Yeah, I'm from a country where the term 'buying' is correct, I've got to get used to saying that I've "bought land use rights" instead! Doesn't help when it doesn't apply when you speak about it in Vietnamese though, so I've got to be more conscious about it.

I've hired an architect and a contractor, I reckoned with it being my first project in the country it'd be a bit safer to get some experienced help.

We're now at the M&E stage of the design, and I did trawl through every bit of information I could find online (including info you've posted here!) and I have to say you're right about plumbers and electricians (haha)!

Yes, there are occasional floods in the area, and your prior post about backflow valves on this forum gave me a heads up about the sewer line design. The plumbing designer is insisting that a stormwater drain (they refer to it as a 'hồ ga') is sufficient as a backflow valve but I'm not so sure so I guess I'll have to source for one and force the contractor to install it. I'm also curious why here they use the hồ ga as a transition from the septic tank to the sewer pipe instead of a direct connection?

I'm sorry, what is a Chinese roof? The current design is a concrete flat with insulation and some form of flooring (probably ceramic tiles) to make the space usable. Would love to find out more about why you recommend a Chinese roof.

I'm finding that the maxim "Location, location, location" in a local context is quite different from what I've experienced in my home country. Would love to hear more of your thoughts on the topic.

Well I would like to see if you need help finding investors.

LaxFogo wrote:

Well I would like to see if you need help finding investors.

Thanks for the interesting proposition, I've sent you a message regarding this.

Granted, the original purpose of me blogging is merely to solicit sharing of information and experiences, but I do appreciate the opportunity to connect with forumers here. Thanks for your interest!

Hello again, I'm in the midst of discussing the building plans with my architect, and there are some stuff that I'm eager to find a 2nd/3rd option for. I already have a couple of options, but would love to find out if anyone here has a few more suppliers just to be thorough about it, did a forum search and found a few leads but there weren't specific to civil construction...

My house design will use terracotta ventilation tiles, or "gạch thông gió", and I'm wondering if anyone knows a small factory that can do custom patterns in small quantities at a reasonable price. I need about 1,000+ bricks in total, with maybe 2-3 variations in pattern.

My architect is also quite ambitious, and he's designed tall steel glass doors for my building! I have a couple of potential suppliers but if anyone has a guy who can pull off 2.8-to-3.2 meter tall steel frame folding and sliding doors (single leaf glass) at a reasonable price, I'd be really grateful to get his contact! Also, does anyone know any good suppliers for accessories for such huge steel doors?

I've been keeping my eyes peeled whenever I visit any commercial buildings here, and noticed the ones that have a security system have a General Electric keypad. Are GE security systems here good? Where I come from Paradox (a company from Canada) is pretty popular, I found a guy in Go Vap that did the installations for Big C and if I can't find anything better I'll be going with him.

I've spoken to a couple of guys who have done concrete floor & ceiling finishes, including a great chap who did the interiors for Liberty Central Pasteur (if anyone wants his contact just say so), but would love to know if anyone has any contacts. I'm looking for a company that has experience producing smooth, blemish-free concrete surfaces, with knowledge of non-stick formwork molding, polishing & sealing.

Thanks in advance!

@LaxFago - Hope you got my mobile via PM safely a couple of weeks back, I haven't gotten a reply from you yet?

All door and window openings should be framed/lined in steel - the normal method of just cementing a window frame in to the brick work is a poor way to do it.

With all openings properly framed attachment of doors/windows is easy and equally easy for maintenance.

Forget about the alarm type during construction - simply extend smooth-bore conduit to each door and window (including internal doors) and bring the conduits together on each floor in a 12 cm plastic conduit box. Double width doors will require the conduit to appear at each side of the door. No need to terminate them, just have the conduit stick out and trim after plastering. Then the boxes are all interconnected vertically - the alarm system should be mounted on the top floor.

Pull string in to each conduit as it is installed and leave there until needed to pull cable in.

The main breaker box should be mounted on the first floor above the ground floor. Each floor should have it's own breaker box fed from the main breaker box.

The main sewer drop should be 16cm diameter with inspection traps at each floor level. (Forget any muttering from an 'architect' - they don't have to clean out drains.

Note that electrical conduit is fireproof - water pipe isn't - so make sure they use the right stuff.

Plan on using LED low voltage lighting - this is  cheaper than full voltage LED lighting!

Thanks Jaitch for the great info! I've also noted down the advice you've given in your other posts too.

Jaitch wrote:

All door and window openings should be framed/lined in steel - the normal method of just cementing a window frame in to the brick work is a poor way to do it.

With all openings properly framed attachment of doors/windows is easy and equally easy for maintenance.

Got it, I'll ask my architect about this. If I remember correctly, the windows of my house will be aluminium but the glass sliding doors will be steel. Do you know any steel fabricators who can make 3.2 x 1.0 meter thin-profile steel frames for doors that can bear the weight of a single leaf 8-10mm tempered glass? Powder coated if possible.

Speaking of which, in one of your previous posts you mentioned knowing a guy who could do stainless steel kitchen appliances, can he do industrial-grade stainless steel kitchen countertops too?

Jaitch wrote:

Forget about the alarm type during construction - simply extend smooth-bore conduit to each door and window (including internal doors) and bring the conduits together on each floor in a 12 cm plastic conduit box. Double width doors will require the conduit to appear at each side of the door. No need to terminate them, just have the conduit stick out and trim after plastering. Then the boxes are all interconnected vertically - the alarm system should be mounted on the top floor.

Pull string in to each conduit as it is installed and leave there until needed to pull cable in.

The main breaker box should be mounted on the first floor above the ground floor. Each floor should have it's own breaker box fed from the main breaker box.

If I understand you correctly, you're talking about running wiring through the walls? I think I have two options now, either to run the wiring conduits via the raised floor (my design opted for inverse floor beams instead of ceiling beams) or hacking the brick walls and embedding the conduit there. Obviously, both ways will involve finding a workaround when there is a floor beam or pillar in the way, I'll have to see the wiring diagram before I can tell.

Apart from making it easy to pull the wires, what other benefits would a conduit box have?

My question about the GE alarm system is more about what system to use. I'm looking for a base like GE, Bosch or Paradox with a couple of PIRs and photoelectric beams (for my perimeter walls) hooked up to it. Does anyone have any experience with this?

Jaitch wrote:

The main sewer drop should be 16cm diameter with inspection traps at each floor level. (Forget any muttering from an 'architect' - they don't have to clean out drains.

I had a heated discussion about inspection traps... the general rule of thumb here seems to be to have none. Had to stomp my feet about having a proper inspection trap for my two septic tanks! In my experience, for the main sewer pipe I should have an inspection trap at:

a) every change of direction
b) every change of incline
c) every connection

but looking at the current plumbing diagram I think it's going to be pretty hard to do that (I'll have traps all over my ground floor!) I also asked if it was the case to separate sewer pipes from stormwater pipes, and it seems the answer is no (stormwater runoff pipes flow into a stormwater drain, or hố ga, which is then connected directly to the main sewer pipe).

Your previous posts also mention about venting, I had an amusing interaction with the engineer about what a vent is  Choosing between a single-stack vs fully vented, I think I'll go with the former as it's cheaper. The question now is if I need an additional P-trap before the sewer stack or are the P-traps at each bathroom appliance good enough.

As I have two pipe shafts in the bathrooms for each volume (front & back) I have to figure out how to dolly up the inspection access so it ties in with the bathroom wall tiling.

Jaitch wrote:

Note that electrical conduit is fireproof - water pipe isn't - so make sure they use the right stuff.

Plan on using LED low voltage lighting - this is  cheaper than full voltage LED lighting!

About lighting, after looking around a bit fluorescent lighting seems to be the best option to use here, I'm leaning towards that. How is the quality of LED lighting here? The problem with LEDs is not only the cost, but the AC-DC driver lifespan... I could go on and on about digital vs analog drivers, the kind of capacitors they use, etc. but the thing is, it's really hard for a layman to check these things. For a house as large as mine I'm expecting more than 100 lighting fixtures, so I'd love to hear some advice about this. My idea to dress up FL tube lights (the cheapest, most prevalent kind of lighting in Vietnam) was forcefully rejected by my architect haha...

benlws wrote:

Got it, I'll ask my architect about this. If I remember correctly, the windows of my house will be aluminium but the glass sliding doors will be steel. Do you know any steel fabricators who can make 3.2 x 1.0 meter thin-profile steel frames for doors that can bear the weight of a single leaf 8-10mm tempered glass? Powder coated if possible.

Cheaper to use Inox/Stainless steel - no painting needed.

benlws wrote:

Speaking of which, in one of your previous posts you mentioned knowing a guy who could do stainless steel kitchen appliances, can he do industrial-grade stainless steel kitchen countertops too?

Granite is better - stainless too noisy. I do do know vendors, though.

Jaitch wrote:

Forget about the alarm type during construction - simply extend smooth-bore conduit to each door and window (including internal doors) and bring the conduits together on each floor in a 12 cm plastic conduit box. Double width doors will require the conduit to appear at each side of the door. No need to terminate them, just have the conduit stick out and trim after plastering. Then the boxes are all interconnected vertically - the alarm system should be mounted on the top floor.

Pull string in to each conduit as it is installed and leave there until needed to pull cable in.

The main breaker box should be mounted on the first floor above the ground floor. Each floor should have it's own breaker box fed from the main breaker box.

If I understand you correctly, you're talking about running wiring through the walls? I think I have two options now, either to run the wiring conduits via the raised floor (my design opted for inverse floor beams instead of ceiling beams) or hacking the brick walls and embedding the conduit there. Obviously, both ways will involve finding a workaround when there is a floor beam or pillar in the way, I'll have to see the wiring diagram before I can tell.

Apart from making it easy to pull the wires, what other benefits would a conduit box have?

Professional, long lasting, no dust collectors. I put my conduits INSIDE the concrete forms and there is no problem.

Jaitch wrote:

My question about the GE alarm system is more about what system to use. I'm looking for a base like GE, Bosch or Paradox with a couple of PIRs and photoelectric beams (for my perimeter walls) hooked up to it. Does anyone have any experience with this?

The PIRs are easy, outside LED flood lights require zero maintenance. You can also use Infra Red LEDs and IR cameras.

Jaitch wrote:

The main sewer drop should be 16cm diameter with inspection traps at each floor level. (Forget any muttering from an 'architect' - they don't have to clean out drains. ...
I had a heated discussion about inspection traps... the general rule of thumb here seems to be to have none. Had to stomp my feet about having a proper inspection trap for my two septic tanks! In my experience, for the main sewer pipe I should have an inspection trap at:
a) every change of direction; b) every change of incline; c) every connection.

Too many. You need a trap at the bottom of the vertical and where the main horizontal exits the floor to the sewer. You can get traps which accept two or three incoming pipes - ideal for cleanouts. Remember you can take sinks, etc., into a floor drain which makes it easy for multiple appliances.

looking at the current plumbing diagram I think it's going to be pretty hard to do that (I'll have traps all over my ground floor!) I also asked if it was the case to separate sewer pipes from stormwater pipes, and it seems the answer is no (stormwater runoff pipes flow into a stormwater drain, or hố ga, which is then connected directly to the main sewer pipe).

Take your rain water pipes separately to the ground then run them out to the street. Rainwater is not good for septic tanks.

Your previous posts also mention about venting, I had an amusing interaction with the engineer about what a vent is. Choosing between a single-stack vs fully vented, I think I'll go with the former as it's cheaper. The question now is if I need an additional P-trap before the sewer stack or are the P-traps at each bathroom appliance good enough.

Your vent pipe need only be a 5cm pipe - it keeps sewer gases out of the house and stops gurgling when you drain a sink.

Jaitch wrote:

Note that electrical conduit is fireproof - water pipe isn't - so make sure they use the right stuff.

Plan on using LED low voltage lighting - this is  cheaper than full voltage LED lighting!
About lighting, after looking around a bit fluorescent lighting seems to be the best option to use here, I'm leaning towards that. How is the quality of LED lighting here? The problem with LEDs is not only the cost, but the AC-DC driver lifespan... I could go on and on about digital vs analog drivers, the kind of capacitors they use, etc. but the thing is, it's really hard for a layman to check these things. For a house as large as mine I'm expecting more than 100 lighting fixtures, so I'd love to hear some advice about this. My idea to dress up FL tube lights (the cheapest, most prevalent kind of lighting in Vietnam) was forcefully rejected by my architect

The trouble is your architect is old style. Low voltage LED lighting is a totally different thought process. My Cam Ranh Bay hotel is 100% LED. High efficiency fluorescents are out - even the USA has discovered LED lighting.

Low voltage systems LEDs are backed up with batteries (as are modems, cell handset chargers, LED TV displays, WiFi, alarms, etc).

ALWAYS remind the hired help to check where the money is coming from - along with the instructions.

Thanks Jaitch for the great info! I've PMed you my number, coffee's on me whenever you have the time!

I'm curious to learn more about the LEDs you're talking about, I always assumed that LEDs were low voltage and wattage, and if there is some new technology that enables the LEDs to go down to lower voltages I'm keen to find out more. If I understand correctly, LEDs are DC powered so you need an AC-DC inverter and a step-down transformer for them to work, so you'd have to either:

A. Have an inverter + transformer at the DB box to convert Vietnam's 220V AC to a lower DC voltage, then hook up all the lights to this, or

B. Buy light fixtures with built-in inverters+transformers and just hook them up to the AC wiring like ordinary light bulbs.

Hope to hear from you soon, do give me a ring when you're in town. Thanks again!

benlws wrote:

If I understand correctly, LEDs are DC powered so you need an AC-DC inverter and a step-down transformer for them to work, so you'd have to either:

All the switches and power outlets in my rented HCM accommodation have cute 3mm blue LEDs to make it easy to find them in the dark,

No transformer needed, just the LED, a capacitor, a resistor and a diode. You have to think differently, and explain to the architects and trades just who is running the show.

We installed low voltage LED lights throughout our new apartment and they are very effective. My missus tells me that they are 6 volt and each light came with its own transformer/voltage dropper, so you just wire them into the mains as normal. They cost about 12 USD apiece. You can get cheaper, made in China ones, but I wouldn't since the quality is likely to be cruddy.  We had fluorescent tubes in our last place and I hated them. These new LED's are very good indeed.

BTW the reason I had to ask my missus for the details is because she wouldn't let me anywhere near the place during the building works, as, whenever I was around, the prices of everything increased.

eodmatt wrote:

We installed low voltage LED lights throughout our new apartment and they are very effective. My missus tells me that they are 6 volt and each light came with its own transformer/voltage dropper, so you just wire them into the mains as normal. They cost about 12 USD apiece. You can get cheaper, made in China ones, but I wouldn't since the quality is likely to be cruddy.  We had fluorescent tubes in our last place and I hated them. These new LED's are very good indeed.

BTW the reason I had to ask my missus for the details is because she wouldn't let me anywhere near the place during the building works, as, whenever I was around, the prices of everything increased.

Hi Matt, thanks for the info! A single 6V LED at more than VND250,000 does sound rather pricey, what is the wattage and lumens rating of each bulb? Do you wire them in serial or parallel? I'm not very good at this and am still learning so do pardon my ignorance.

http://shop.dienquang.com/san-pham/en-h … t-1.2m-f26

A typical VND14,000 1.2 meter T8 flourescent tube from Dien Quang is 18W/36W, assuming a typical ballast and an efficiency of 50-70 lumens/watt, this computes to 900-2520 Lumens. Not enough for a typical living room, which needs about 200 lux (i.e. 200 lumens/m2). Since my rooms are about 40m2 I would need about 8000 lumens to achieve this level of brightness. Assuming each 6V LED bulb has a 40 lumen rating I would need about 200 of them, which adds up to a whopping VND50,000,000 in LEDs per room?

I took some notes during my last visit to Metro, a Philips 42W Helix E27 220-240V with a 66 lumens/watt efficiency, one bulb gives me 2,772 lumens for the price of about VND170,000. Therefore, to light up a 40m2 room at 200 lux I would spend approximately VND510,000 which is 1% of the price above. Obviously 3 bulbs = 126 watts but I would like to find out what is your LED wattage and lumens rating to make a fair comparison (a typical 6V LED bulb is about 1-3 watts so 200 of them would be 200-600 watts!).

Hope to hear from you soon! If you're interested in what the heck is a lux and a lumen you can read up here:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lux

eodmatt wrote:

BTW the reason I had to ask my missus for the details is because she wouldn't let me anywhere near the place during the building works, as, whenever I was around, the prices of everything increased.

I can imagine, I am an Asian foreigner who doesn't look so different from a Vietnamese so I can meet people and hang around. Just enough Vietnamese literacy to discuss construction stuff so it's not so bad, though some locals do try to give me the roundaround when they realise my vocabulary is limited so I can't debate a point haha.... it helps that my architect has previous project quotations that I can refer to as a benchmark. Haven't got to the part where I'm negotiating the finishing materials yet though, fingers crossed that when it comes to that stage my Vietnamese has improved more.

Haven't had much time to blog, my construction should be starting soon with the demolition and piling (before Tet), fingers crossed that I don't encounter any more roadblocks and local drama.

benlws wrote:

eodmatt wrote:

We installed low voltage LED lights throughout our new apartment and they are very effective. My missus tells me that they are 6 volt and each light came with its own transformer/voltage dropper, so you just wire them into the mains as normal. They cost about 12 USD apiece. You can get cheaper, made in China ones, but I wouldn't since the quality is likely to be cruddy.  We had fluorescent tubes in our last place and I hated them. These new LED's are very good indeed.

BTW the reason I had to ask my missus for the details is because she wouldn't let me anywhere near the place during the building works, as, whenever I was around, the prices of everything increased.

Hi Matt, thanks for the info! A single 6V LED at more than VND250,000 does sound rather pricey, what is the wattage and lumens rating of each bulb? Do you wire them in serial or parallel? I'm not very good at this and am still learning so do pardon my ignorance.

http://shop.dienquang.com/san-pham/en-h … t-1.2m-f26

A typical VND14,000 1.2 meter T8 flourescent tube from Dien Quang is 18W/36W, assuming a typical ballast and an efficiency of 50-70 lumens/watt, this computes to 900-2520 Lumens. Not enough for a typical living room, which needs about 200 lux (i.e. 200 lumens/m2). Since my rooms are about 40m2 I would need about 8000 lumens to achieve this level of brightness. Assuming each 6V LED bulb has a 40 lumen rating I would need about 200 of them, which adds up to a whopping VND50,000,000 in LEDs per room?

I took some notes during my last visit to Metro, a Philips 42W Helix E27 220-240V with a 66 lumens/watt efficiency, one bulb gives me 2,772 lumens for the price of about VND170,000. Therefore, to light up a 40m2 room at 200 lux I would spend approximately VND510,000 which is 1% of the price above. Obviously 3 bulbs = 126 watts but I would like to find out what is your LED wattage and lumens rating to make a fair comparison (a typical 6V LED bulb is about 1-3 watts so 200 of them would be 200-600 watts!).

Hope to hear from you soon! If you're interested in what the heck is a lux and a lumen you can read up here:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lux

Wattage is if I remember well, 9 watts. Lumens - no idea and I'll pass on lux and lumens, I deal with things like trinitrotoluene & pentaerythritoltetranitrate in my job, so I have way too much stuff cluttering up my brain as it is!

You'll prolly need to call in at one of the many shops that sells the things to get the spec from the horses mouth. All I can tell you is that they are very good, the light quality is excellent, they don't flicker, they light up instantly, they don't give off any heat and they are said to last 6 times longer that fluorescent lights and 20 times longer than incandescent lights and they don't contain mercury and stuff.. There's a chart here for comparisons: http://www.designrecycleinc.com/led%20comp%20chart.html

I can tell you that I will never go back to tube lights and bulbs now.

Good luck!

benlws wrote:

Assuming each 6V LED bulb has a 40 lumen rating I would need about 200 of them, which adds up to a whopping VND50,000,000 in LEDs per room?

After I replied, I did some further reading. The 40 lumen LED bulbs I found on Alibaba may not be the ones you're using at home. So to use a different assumption, an IKEA USD $15 Ledare E26 20W LED bulb has a 1,000 lumen rating, so for a 200 lux brightness of a 40m2 room (8,000 lumens total) I would need 8 of these puppies running at 160W total, which adds up to about VND2.52 million, which is 3x the cost of three energy-saving Philips CFLs running at 126 watts total.

It's easy to slip up the numbers as you and Jaitch use volts instead of watts, I got confused because bulbs are typically denoted using the latter. Anyway, would love to know the wattage and lumens rating of your LED bulbs!

benlws wrote:

eodmatt wrote:

BTW the reason I had to ask my missus for the details is because she wouldn't let me anywhere near the place during the building works, as, whenever I was around, the prices of everything increased.

I can imagine, I am an Asian foreigner who doesn't look so different from a Vietnamese so I can meet people and hang around. Just enough Vietnamese literacy to discuss construction stuff so it's not so bad, though some locals do try to give me the roundaround when they realise my vocabulary is limited so I can't debate a point haha.... it helps that my architect has previous project quotations that I can refer to as a benchmark. Haven't got to the part where I'm negotiating the finishing materials yet though, fingers crossed that when it comes to that stage my Vietnamese has improved more.

Haven't had much time to blog, my construction should be starting soon with the demolition and piling (before Tet), fingers crossed that I don't encounter any more roadblocks and local drama.

As I said before, good luck! Even though my missus is Vietnamese we still had to watch the builders like a hawk. Watch out for them trying things like using inferior cheap paint, not cutting tiles correctly, using cheap grout instead of proper waterproof tile grout and on and on. My missus took the precaution of withholding 20% of the builders invoice pending a snagging inspection. We found a few problems, nothing major,  just idleness and cheating and we asked the builder to come back and fix things. He declined saying that he had lost face and that we could keep the 20%.

eodmatt wrote:

Wattage is if I remember well, 9 watts. Lumens - no idea and I'll pass on lux and lumens, I deal with things like trinitrotoluene & pentaerythritoltetranitrate in my job, so I have way too much stuff cluttering up my brain as it is!

You'll prolly need to call in at one of the many shops that sells the things to get the spec from the horses mouth. All I can tell you is that they are very good, the light quality is excellent, they don't flicker, they light up instantly, they don't give off any heat and they are said to last 6 times longer that fluorescent lights and 20 times longer than incandescent lights and they don't contain mercury and stuff.. There's a chart here for comparisons: http://www.designrecycleinc.com/led%20comp%20chart.html

I can tell you that I will never go back to tube lights and bulbs now.

Good luck!

Thanks Matt, you replied as I was typing my previous post. I would love to have your job if it involves blowing things up!!

9 watt LEDs are equivalent to around 1,000-1,300 lumens so yeah, you'd need 6-8 bulbs vs 3 energy saving CFLs. I'd love to go down the LED route too, benefits and all, but cost vs savings is a huge factor. If the LEDs can save me as much electricty as energy saving CFLs in the long run I'd gladly go down that route, but I'm a bit worried about the lifespan of LED bulbs as just x1 replacement wipes out any TCO savings. I did some math and the lumen count for LEDs is too low to cover a 500m2 building (i.e. I have to buy more bulbs compared to energy-saving CFLs), there is a reason why even 4-5 star hotels don't deck out full LED setups and that's the cost factor.

Thanks for the input though, I learnt something new!

eodmatt wrote:

As I said before, good luck! Even though my missus is Vietnamese we still had to watch the builders like a hawk. Watch out for them trying things like using inferior cheap paint, not cutting tiles correctly, using cheap grout instead of proper waterproof tile grout and on and on. My missus took the precaution of withholding 20% of the builders invoice pending a snagging inspection. We found a few problems, nothing major,  just idleness and cheating and we asked the builder to come back and fix things. He declined saying that he had lost face and that we could keep the 20%.

Thanks for the wishes, Matt. Yeah, I've heard of many horror stories from architects and friends regarding Vietnamese construction, I'll need to spend a lot of time on-site to watch them. Plus I've devoured two books on construction fundamentals just to have a base understanding of the process of construction. It helps when there is so much info online too, I've learnt enough to start my own construction company! (haha just joking it's nowhere near enough)

Kudos for the tip about witholding partial payment, we plan to do that too.

Good luck and I'm interested to keep following.  I've been reading the blog.  This is something I've been considering for myself, maybe in a couple of years time although I would be looking around the Tan Binh district rather than Binh Thanh.

I have no architectural experience myself (well, software I do but not buildings) but I have an uncle who is an architect who I might draw on for some advice.  Otherwise any tidbits that I can pick up on along the way would be useful.

Interestingly I had been contemplating a green roof but I wasn't entirely aware of the difficulties that would impose.  Currently my "green roof" is a bunch of potted plants on the outside / roof area of the house I'm currently renting.

delatbabel wrote:

Good luck and I'm interested to keep following.  I've been reading the blog.  This is something I've been considering for myself, maybe in a couple of years time although I would be looking around the Tan Binh district rather than Binh Thanh.

I have no architectural experience myself (well, software I do but not buildings) but I have an uncle who is an architect who I might draw on for some advice.  Otherwise any tidbits that I can pick up on along the way would be useful.

Interestingly I had been contemplating a green roof but I wasn't entirely aware of the difficulties that would impose.  Currently my "green roof" is a bunch of potted plants on the outside / roof area of the house I'm currently renting.

Hi, I'm thrilled to meet someone who has the patience to read through my long-winded ramblings! Haha... it's the holiday season and with my building starting I haven't had the time I need to sit down and write a new blog post. The old house just got knocked down and we'll begin piling works soon.

Would love to meet up with you and your wife over a cup of coffee/tea/whatever to chitchat, if you want to get in touch I'll PM you my phone number and we can meet up over the weekend! I see you've settled down in Tan Binh, I'm in the Dakao area now so we can meet halfway if it's convenient or somewhere downtown is great too!

I recently bought a couple of taps from my home country, after being dismayed by the choices here (INAX, Toto or the cheaper Ceaser were the only brands my architect was willing to work with at my price range). I wonder if anyone has experience doing housing materials importing, I would love to introduce some great quality products that Vietnam lacks right now.

how do you know so much about construction?
i plan to build 400m2 x 3 story open span building , part commercial part residential in binh tan district and looking for a construction manager/supervisor? are you available for hire?

how do you know so much about construction?
i am looking for construction manager / supervisor for a project in binh tan?
are you available

Good day sir, i am carlo looking for a contruction company. can you please send me your email address. thanks in advance sir. happy new year.

Your site saigonsettler.com is down, was it ever up?

Was interested in reading about what you did.

bizdeals wrote:

how do you know so much about construction?
i am looking for construction manager / supervisor for a project in binh tan?
are you available

You may want to check the date of posting, this thread is nearly 3 years old.

colinoscapee wrote:

bizdeals wrote:

how do you know so much about construction?
i am looking for construction manager / supervisor for a project in binh tan?
are you available

You may want to check the date of posting, this thread is nearly 3 years old.

Yeah, I knew it was because i did actually check. The guy built a house in vietnam and said he documented it. I'm interested in reading it because it's most likely in english and potentially useful info, however old.

Wayback Machine to the rescue.

https://web.archive.org/web/20141028051 … ttler.com/

https://web.archive.org/web/20141218075 … ttler.com/

I did not read the whole thing, but there are posts there about his project.

top man

really good stuff in those links. thanks alot!

I took some notes during my last visit to Metro, a Philips 42W Helix E27 220-240V with a 66 lumens/watt efficiency, one bulb gives me 2,772 lumens for the price of about VND170,000. Therefore, to light up a 40m2 room at 200 lux I would spend approximately VND510,000 which is 1% of the price above. Obviously 3 bulbs = 126 watts but I would like to find out what is your LED wattage and lumens rating to make a fair comparison (a typical 6V LED bulb is about 1-3 watts so 200 of them would be 200-600 watts!).
http://denledquangtrung.com/danh-muc/den-led-op-tran

Hope to hear from you soon! If you're interested in what the heck is a lux and a lumen you can read up here: