Are you interested in real estate?
Are you looking at gaining knowledge in building construction?
Are you thinking of playing in the real estate sector?
Do you want insight into reasons behind different structural failures and their remedies?
Then you're at the right place. Follow me as I breakdown in layman terms building construction and management.

Today we will be looking at Types of buildings.

All buildings are designed based on two methods

The 2 types of building include;

1) Load bearing walls

2) Framed Struthers.

1) Load bearing walls are buildings designed to have the walls as the carrier of all the loads to the foundation.
This type of design is only used for buildings with maximum of 2 floors. That is your bungalow and structures having one suspended floor.

2) Framed structures are used for any building that have 3 floors and above. In this method of building design all the building loads are borne by the Slabs, Beams and Columns which then transmit the loads to the foundation.
The concept of framed structures is used without any floor limits either for concrete or steel structures.
In framed structures, your blockwalls does not contribute structurally to the stability of the building but only serving the purpose of partitioning.

Attached are pictures showing these 2 type of buildings

We will continue in our knowledge sharing in a couple of days.

My name is Engr. Steven Ajayi-James
I am a Registered Civil Engineer and a Certified Project Manager.

Looking forward to seeing your questions and queries as we embark on this knowledge sharing journey.

Best regards always.

Good day guys. So sorry I was away for a couple of days.

Welcome back to our Construction 101 class.

Looking again at the 2 different type of buildings.

1) Load bearing Wall Structures is a cheaper way of constructing a building that is not more than 2 floors.
There is no need for any concrete components in this structure except the window and door opening areas.
A load bearing wall structure requires quality strong blocks since the block is the carrier of all structural loads.
Sourcing of strong quality blocks have been a charge in most parts of Nigeria today and it can be too expensive to ordinary people where it's available.
This have been the bane of high construction cost in Nigeria.

2) Framed Structures; All loads on these structures are being borne by the slab, beams and the columns. The columns transmit all loads to the foundation. In framed structures, the quality of your blocks does not matter. Blocks only serve the purpose of partitioning. So the floor spaces in a framed structure can be played around with because removing a blockwall does not affect the structural stability.
Every building above 2 floors have to be framed because there is no block that can sustain the weight of a structure above 2 floors.

Thank you for reading.

Looking forward to seeing you at in a couple of days.

I am your companion in the school of construction
Engr. Steven Ajayi-James.