CONSTRUCTING YOUR HOME- A BAD DREAM OR A FAIRYTALE DESTINATION

 

Take a Glimpse of My Story before beginning your Building Construction Journey.

Finally, I completed my house Construction this December.  It was a nerve-wracking experience. Challenges never stopped coming their way, since I decided to start constructing my so-called dream house. The day I decided to start the building construction on my own without anyone’s help seems to be my D day. Since that Day I had numerous sleepless nights. I will let you know how a single decision can change your life like hell.

I am Paritosh Patro, a Software engineer by profession, hailing in the smart city Bhubaneswar. I have 6+ years of experience in the IT field. The way in 2018 I married a princess of Kolkata, since then I decided to build her a fairytale destination in my own city. Both of us took the transfer to Bhubaneswar and start living in our parental house in Old Bhubaneswar. This location was too far away from our office. The roadway to our office was filled with huge traffic. With so many issues there was one more issue that in-filtered my life, to keep a work-life balance.  So finally I made up my mind to start my hunt for a Home that satisfies all my criteria.

I started pondering upon lots of plotting schemes as purchasing a flat was out of the question. After all, having a duplex of your own is far better than a sharing occupancy. Now well established gated community for Vilas are coming up in form of plotting schemes. I started searching out such plotted real estate properties nearby my office location within a radius of 5-8 Km. This is when I came across a property in Daruthenga, all thanks to a hyper-local Youtube video channel named Reale Hero. 

This property was just 5 km from my office near Infosys Square.  Just opposite to the plot we have an upcoming school coming up and even lots of government proposals were in line for future road connectivity. I started collecting all the documents related to the land. As I found all the documents to be genuine, I decided to purchase it.

The plotting scheme gave us a lot many amenities like 30 feet internal Road gated community and Open Spaces for plantation. Additionally, they also apply for the land Homestead conversion under the group scheme. Finally, at the year-end, we purchased the plot. The homestead application took 8 months long. Without wasting much time we planned out the blueprint of our dream destination. We hired a professional consultancy team named Civil Center to prepare our architectural and structural drawings.

After our homestead application was approved, we decided to apply for building plan approval under the local developmental authority. Our consultant helped us in getting overbuilding plan approval done within 4 month Window Period. Within this period we also prepared the building estimate which was close to rupees 60 lakhs. Now, this was out of our budget so we decided to take a home loan. Now during this process, we came across some more points that need to be taken care of. To process the loan, our building approval letter was compulsory and the land should not have any litigation involved. In case it was my savings then I wouldn’t have needed any approval. But this is the rule, which killed our time day by day. Still we kept patience and in the mean time we started taking offers from various contractors. This was the time when we came across another shock. The price quoted by contractors was very confusing and inflated. They charged us Rs. 1600 Per Roof Area in Sqft. These charges included lots of hidden or extra charges. After lots of investigation we came across a Contractor, on reference of one of our relation. He was very polite and decent in his approach. We stopped our entire search and pitched in to finalize this know yet unknown Contractor to build our fairytale destination. We neither negotiated the price as it looked awkward to bargain with a reference Contractor. With some small yet extensive discussions we finalize the details of the project and finally awarded him the contract at Rs. 1550/Roof Area in Sqft. Flat Rate and No extra or hidden cost involved. Even he agreed without any hesitation.

After heavy follow-ups our Building Plan got approved and after all documentation finally our loan got sanctioned as well. It was in Mid June when all those processing was completed we tighten our seatbelts to enter into the complex process of building construction. Our Contractor built a small labor hutment and the other day electric lines were drawn to the hutment. Like every proud owner we started the work with a Bhumi Puja on a very auspicious note. The same day under-ground Borewell was also established. The next day manual excavation team arrived and the very day it rained like anything. With the same date we entered into deep low pressure generated rainy season and deep trouble awaiting us. I know you are eager to read the upcoming trouble. So here it is…

After the low pressure monsoon got over we started our excavation works. It was a sunny day and this day I was hopeful that the team would be completing at least 50% of the excavation works, but there was a nightmare waiting for us. Just after getting 2’ deep excavation, we found water plunging out from the excavated pit. We couldn’t excavate it out as more water started accumulating coming from nowhere. Sooner the entire plot got drowned under at least 2’ deep water. The entire event was ransacked. It was difficult to construct now. Many of my elders have warned me before entering into building construction during rainy days, but all I did is entered the same in a gut feeling. Now we had no choice than to abandon the project till the water level goes down. By the month of November all the water got drained off. And water level also dropped off. We called our Contractor back and asked him to restart. By now his behavior had a massive drift. By then, to start the work he took an advance of Rs. 5,00,000/-. As a reference vendor we had full faith on him that he won’t cheat us, so we didn’t ask him to return our money back. Now he was changed man, he demanded more money to restart the work. Feeling helpless and not disturbing our reference relative we paid him an advance of Rs. 2,00,000/-. He started the work in full flow. 

We thought our pain ended there, but this time a local issue cropped up. A nearby Plot owner alleged that our builder has encroached a pie of his land. This was again baseless but had to bear it. The local issue was out of my control. The plot developers came up for my help. Somehow they settled it but local goons of the area started coming to the plot regularly asking for ransom or face loot at the site. They manhandled the laborers at the site, looted cement bags from the store, and broke the newly jointed walls. Due to these frequent disturbances, our Contractor stopped the work. I had to engage local police for help. Even that issue was resolved, but now the contractor started playing his own tantrums. 

He asked out for the losses caused due to loot. Well, why should I pay for the losses? I didn’t he stopped the work in the mid of the project. I was forced to involve my relation who gave his reference. Even our relative was in no way concern about the Contractor he referred. He seemed very blatant in his approach that he was in no way related to the Work given to him. This was how close reference work. Time was testing my patience like anything. I had to call my contractor and persuaded him to start the work at the behest of agreeing to all the terms and conditions of restarting the work. Meanwhile, he also pointed out a contract clause stating price rise factors. I overlooked them at that time and said I agree with all your rules. The work restarted with full swing. Everything seemed perfect to me. He cast the core house slab of Ground Floor and started building the 1^st Floor. He took almost all the money as per contract value. I gave out because I had trust on him. But this didn’t end there as just before putting the slab he asked for more money. This time it was exceeding the contract value. He didn’t even complete the Core House and he was charging me the entire amount and here comes the Price rise Escalation Clause in to the picture. I dragged him to court; there he saved his ass taking note of the contract agreement price rise clause. Even the project contract had expired due to delay in works for unforeseen circumstances for which the contractor is not liable. I was in deep trouble for not renewing the same. That contractor fled away with all my hard-earned money. I was helpless; the entire process was like a Bad Dream for me.  Finally, I came out from the process of hitting hard, I played cool. In this unorganized market, at least some professional companies will be trying hard to fill in those extra-large gaps. 

There I found this Online Building Construction Brand providing both services and materials in a Market Place model. All the listed Servicemen were verified and highly skilled as per rating and review. Who would touch a half unconsolidated construction work? I was bound to take the services of team Builtify to hire a trained Supervisor for my site, who would coordinate the work on my behalf for my site. Guess what it was awesome. The way this Builtify Trained Supervisor communicated with me, helped me in getting my work done in an affordable way. He shared me various cost cutting techniques and servicemen hiring techniques to quickly complete my core house and finishing jobs. I didn’t even have to go to the site or any material show room. He reported me providing me daily Wages Report, Curing Report, QA/QC checklists before and after completing any work. All procurement was done over Builtify building  Construction Materials e-commerce app. It was cake walk then. Why didn’t I come across this platform in the beginning? Traditional Building Construction techniques are gone, now it’s time for Builtify like team for revolutionizing the entire building construction industry.

I can never forget those Bad Dreams of mine, but now I feel awesome as my dream destination is ready for me and my generations to come. All thanks to Team Builtify.