Awuku Dela

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Filtering by Tag: Accra

Beam of the Week: Check up on your Construction Project in Ghana

 

Overseeing your building project can prove tricky when you’re not in Ghana. Regular check-ins are key to protect yourself from unpleasant surprises, yet often require your physical presence on the ground. The Beam Crew can help!

...continue reading article from LINK

I came across this on the internet this morning. I find it interesting in that it would be something someone would engage in for two reasons. There might be more reason but I feel these are the two main reasons. The first would be if you did not trust the building company you had come to an agreement with to build you house, and secondly if you had absolutely no one as a backup to provide the services Beam are offering. Based on the culture of getting even a relative to assist you in anything, I find the services of Beam very valid. As someone living abroad with friends or relatives living in Ghana, it can become very difficult and frustrating to rely on them to assist you with your building project. Lets break this down further. Lets say you ask your relative to keep an eye on your project by providing you with update via pictures and any other form of communication. Initially, the task you have given will be carried out as expected, but as time goes by you then find out that the updates you were expecting trail off either slightly or drastically to a point whereby the stop completely. I should point out that, as expected you would not engage your relative in such a task without providing some monetery incentive. How else would you expect him/her to travel to the site and/or buy credit to send you those all important pictures. There is also the possibility that you will be getting phone calls asking for additional money to cover ridicolous expenses. 

Out of curiosity, I have sent them my whatsapp number. Someone should contact me later today. I will be interested in finding out how much their fees are. Update to follow.

Communication Is Vital [For The Success Of Any Project]

There is one thing which I have never been pleased with since the commencement of the Nyaniba project at Osu, and that is the frequency the builder communicates with me and also his attitude towards communication. It is absolutely very bad. Upon reflection I released that I was the one always calling the builder and asking him to send me updates on the progress of the building. Two weeks ago, I decided that this had gone to far and that I needed to explain to him my expectations from him in terms of his communicating with me on the progress of the building. So i picked up the phone, called him and told him that moving forward, this was what I expected from him. Last week I heard nothing from the builder. I had to send him a "whatsapp" message and a text message for him to check his "whatsapp" message. On Friday, I still had not had any word from him. I spoke to my brother in Ghana and asked him to see if he could get hold of the builder. He [my brother] was actually surprised because he had himself stressed to the builder that it was important for him to provide me with updates regularly. Finally, two days ago, the builder got in touch. He, apologised for the silence, but went on to say that there had been no progress on the building project because the structural engineer had requested that the materials the builder had purchased for the plumbing were not what was on his architectural drawings. It appears the structural engineer had different drawings from what the builder had. I managed to keep myself from exploding in anger. I told the builder that this should have been mentioned to me immediately.

I am surprised at the builders lack of concern on the issue of communication. Is it a "Ghana" thing? I mean, it is alright as a client if you live in Ghana and therefore have the flexibility of popping over to you building site whenever you feel like it. At least that way you have the option of getting updates for yourself. For his own sake, I think I will need to have a "teacher/student" chat with him on this. I do not think he has had the privilege of putting up a building for someone living outside Ghana, because if he did, he would have some sort of "template" that would enable him to provide updates to his client[s]. I have another telephone meeting with him tomorrow and my plan is to get him to email me with detailed updates twice every week. I do not think that should be too hard for him.

Lessons learnt - make sure that you as a client, sit down with your builder to agree on some form of communication by which the builder shall/will provide you with detailed regular updates. These updates should include pictures and/or videos showing progress of the building.

Setting Up And Preparing For First Floor Works.

Next week, the electrician will be doing some work before more construction work can be continued. The building project is shaping up as per the project time line.

I have created a picture movie time line which shows, starting from the architects 3D drawing to the current state the project is at. Enjoy

Demolition Of Main Building - Day One

On Monday morning Boadi - Building Contractor - came over to my place so that we could sit down and discus payment terms and go over the breakdown of payment structure and the schedule he had outlined for the building till completion. After a lengthy discussion which obviously involved me asking him questions I had on aspects of the building project I did not understand, I finally wrote a cheque out to him for GHC89,000.00. This payment represented the first payment out of 4 payments needed to complete the building. Below is a snapshot of the payment schedule drawn up.

So the general word of advice is never to hand over the total sum of money needed to build your house to the builder for obvious reasons. Also, the reason why you are paying in parts is to give you the opportunity to inspect each stage of the project based on the money you have paid for each stage. For instance, in my case, after my first payment for the Substructure; I will need to inspect the progress of the completed Substructure work. If for some reason I am short of funds, I can decide to put the project on hold until I have funds to continue which will mean me making the second payment - Superstructure. The progression continues until the forth and final payment. 

The general conception is that erecting a building does not involve much cost, but rather it is the other items needed, that is tiles, air conditioners, windows [glass], doors - you get my drift; that gulps up your funds. If you want you building to be very nice with quality items to complete it the it means you are going to spend more money. 

This morning the workers arrived at around 8.00am to start work. I had no idea how they were going to tackle stripping of the main building. After they had changed into their work clothes, the carpenters constructed a make shift ladder and two of them went onto the roof and proceeded to remove the roofing sheets. The electrician arrived later in the afternoon and he immediately got down to removing the main switch board and disconnecting anything electrical. The air conditioners were removed and have been stored in the shed - remember the shed I told you about? It is serving it purpose now. All the glass windows and glass sliding doors have been removed and also stored in the shed. The frames housing the glass windows and glass sliding doors will be removed tomorrow. Anything that can be salvaged is going to be kept and auctioned or given away. I plan of selling the glass windows and glass sliding doors because they are fairly new. I don't know what can be done with the roofing slates. I will have to ask the builder about them. The skirting boards from the building will be given to a friend. He has asked for them so that he can construct a temporary fence on his Dad's property. Noting is being wasted. Even the bricks from the demolished can be sold on to another builder who might require them to land fill a property that needs filling. I have been pretty much busy myself taking pictures [smile].



Shed Construction - Day Two

The work men reported to work around 9.00am. They did say that they would have arrived earlier had it not been for the amount of traffic on the roads. Boadi, the builder was not around. I ddi not expect him to be actually as he had his site foreman taking care of things. Work continues with finishing off the outer shell of the shed. I have been informed that concrete flooring will be done tomorrow as well as doors to the shed. 


Shed Construction - Day One

Yesterday, around mid morning a pick up pulled into my house with all the necessary items needed to build the shed. I had mentioned earlier that the plan was to have a shed built so that I could store all my things in it. With the absence of dedicated storage facilities in Accra [not that I know off anyway], the best option was to build a shed. Plus even if I did find someone who was willing to store these things for me, I would be looking at transporting my stuff to another location and worrying about security at this new location.

Anyway, once the items had been off loaded from the pickup, the men responsible for building the shed quickly got down to business. By 5.30PM they had the shell of the shed constructed. Today they have the roofing, flooring [concrete] and doors to do. I suppose I can start moving stuff into the shed in a weeks time. By this time the concrete flooring would have set.


Searching For Something To "Knock Me Out"

My initial thoughts for plot 22 was to renovate both the Out Building and the Main House. However after careful thought coupled with ideas from other sources and finally looking at the finances available to me; the best option was to demolish the whole place and build a new structure. Ok so that was the first thing out the way. The second issue, finding an example of a house, built or picture was not hard to find. My brother has recently built himself a  house at McCarthy Hill. It is absolutely beautiful. I had previously seen optics of it on Facebook, but my immediate thoughts were that these were probably optics he had obtained elsewhere (smile). I did not even realise he was having a house built for him and his family. The house looks lovely, something certainly along my tastes. When I was in Ghana this March, I made arrangements with him one afternoon for him to take me to his crib. The optics did not tell a lie. It even has a swimming pool! The amazing thing is that so much detail has been incorporated onto a limited portion of land. Next door to him, his neighbour is almost 80% completed on his building. It looked absolutely horrible. I see a lot of these types of buildings being built in Accra. They are hideous. They have massive roofs and about two to fours tall pillars making up part of the front of the building. I totally hate them.