Thank you Mr Opalu,
I always follow your work here.
As matter of fact all building work has been done. It's just the fence that remains on one side.
You have been to my site before if you remember.
As for Blinding, its the ordinary one I want to do.
The building has already been completed.

opalu:
Fyguy, I have questions for you.
1. Tell us what soil formation we are talking about.
2. Have you done the soil test?
3. What type of blinding do you want to do? Ordinary blinding or improved type?

Hello Engineers/Builders in the House

I hope you can help me with some advice regarding the construction of a long fence o my site.
The fence in question (one side) is the long side of a 1.5 plot which needs to be constructed. Due to the cost implications of doing a raft foundation for this fence I have been advised to do the following to save some costs.
1. Do the blinding for the whole length of the fence
2. Instead of doing a raft foundation I use 3 coaches of 9 inch blocks
3. Pour cement/sand/granite into the 9 inch blocks
4. Use 6 inch blocks for the remaining coaches till we reach the desired height
5. Do the couping once desired height is reach

Please note we will be casting the pillars as normal.
Please advice.

Will this work? Are there any other options that

Hello NLer’s
I hope you can help me with some advice regarding the construction of a long fence o my site.
The fence in question (one side) is the long side of a 1.5 plot which needs to be constructed. Due to the cost implications of doing a raft foundation for this fence I have been advised to do the following to save some costs.
1. Do the blinding for the whole length of the fence
2. Instead of doing a raft foundation I use 3 coaches of 9 inch blocks
3. Pour cement/sand/granite into the 9 inch blocks
4. Use 6 inch blocks for the remaining coaches till we reach the desired height
5. Do the couping once desired height is reach

Please note we will be casting the pillars as normal.
Please advice.

Will this work? Are there any other options that

House,

Please I need your advice on something very important to me.

I am finishing my project and my builder here in California has done all my projects here.

Has anyone explored the possiblity of bringing some qualified builders/decorators from abroad to complete their finishing?

Some of the finishing I am seeing here seems to be a low standard. No disrespect to anybody.

@Brabus,

Thanks for the detailed response.

Most of the questions I have to ask have already been asked by the other members so all I can say is that I hope you and Oga Maverick can resolve this in good time.

Also as Egun has alluded to it will be worth looking into having a strong legal team behind your firm to avoid all these misunderstandings.

brabus:
@fyguy, the money paid is meant for approval. The guy agreed to do the approval but he said the client needs to bring in all the necessary supporting documents when they're ready so as to complete the process. Pls don't get me wrong.

The thing is the client want to build and I told him I won't want to have a face off with the government agencies which made me to ask the client to try and tidy up loose ends before moving to site. So in essence, it will mean it's a work in progress and not that nothing has been done and we are building without approval when the Lagos guys comes.

Yes, I realized this may be a bad pattern to follow but what I did was to avert paying huge sum for settlement when you can actually use the same to commence the processing legitimately. The same thing applied to the other guys you mentioned. The Lagos guys went to the site and the client never had to pay anything at the time they visited because I've already asked the guy to take care of it.

Now, coming back to tell me the approval was fake. Alausa has confirmed it fake is not something I can understand. The same guy did the approval for my site at Agungi and I never had issues with the Lagos boys and everything was cleared out when all the processing documents were complete. I can recall a Nairalander building on the same axis with me at Agungi calling to ask for how to go about it. I just forwarded the details of the guy to him and asked them to deal directly.

Now, if the best way to go is to leave all third party operations to client to deal with whoever directly. I think I'll do just that to have my peace. But I'm only acting as a broker between the two parties and more importantly protecting my clients interest while building the structure.

One thing I want the client to be sincere of is this. He knew I did all my best on his project and what made me mad is that he chooses to pick on my innocent self all the time and ran away from the real issues crumbling his project.
Will you ever believe that we spent almost 3 days to do the DPC of a house that's less that 340m²? Why?

The same way I told him about securing approval from the govt, I told him to offset Omo oniles so that we can work without disturbance. But even after paying the Omo oniles the sum of 400k directly by himself through his good friend who helped him purchase the land, the guy still come back at every MINUTE (even seconds) to demand for payments from the client and had to delay work and cause all sort of nuisances. Everybody involved in the payment were just playing games with the client and I told him why should you pay 400k to someone and still end up getting billed another 900k plus for the construction itself. This is insane. Something needs to be done about it. It was at this point that all the territorial powers in the dynasty ganged up against me saying that I am blocking their way. I ensured the client terminate his relationship with that his friend when he came to meet me right in the presence of the same me mavverick to ask for his percentage on the job that I was doing and I told him you can come and collect the job that I owe him nothing.

Too much stories but in all honesty I feel pity that mr Maverrick chose to be played by all the people he associated with and he feel good about it so long they are not related to Brabus.

Lots of accusations here and there. But here's the big question.

1. When material are purchased? Who confirms the quantity?
2. How many occasions did I tell him the granite been supplied to him is not 30 tons that 30 tons truck cannot get to the site?
3. The wood supplier keeps pressurizing him to buy woods to the extent that bamboo for the decking were supplied at lintel stage and I was like why the succumbing to pressure. Has wood become a scarce commodity? Problem starts when materials are kept without on site without a good goal keeper.
4. At a point in time, I got so mad that the man is loosing too much on materials because it's like he was been held down at gun point. I then told him to compare the estimates and confirm it everything is going according to plan. I even went ahead to tell him to recheck the expenses during the foundation stage when we managed the work viz a viz other stages that he managed. That was there any time we went over budget or come back asking for extras/variations?
5. What would mr mavverick have done when the officials came to mark X on the site if there was no prior arrangement? I'm sure we can read that there's no where he can claim to pay twice for the same thing here. Maybe, he will be happy to pay whatever the guy charged him and be happier for it so long it wasn't handled by Brabus. So refund is completely out of it if no money was paid to settle the boys during the period of construction.


As much as DIY is good, if you choose to turn blind eye to good advices, just consider yourself as another Moses leading the Israelites to the promise land. The suppliers will be happier for it.

For those who do not know, sand sells for 9 and 13k for 15 and 20 tons in the mining site. Every other cost is transport, profit and settlements. Isn't it fair enough to look for ways to cut excesses in other to avoid project overrun?

Trouble started looming when mr Maverrick is offshooting his target at every phases and I asked him if you paid the sum of money to me and I come back to you, what will you have done? He said I cannot do it because I'm not a Santa Claus and I told him. Yea, you're right but what he's doing is what I did for 3strike for N10m and we did all that was required of us without asking the client for any dime extra. No accusation of stealing whatsoever. I handled the payment of Omo Onile fee at 3strike site when the boys had turned themselves into militants and we never had to pay any extra till completion of works. If anything is paid to anyone, it'll be after I was gone and I knew that man (3strike), he will not pay any kobo.

Again, let me rest here. Mr mavverick, I'm not your enemy and I'm sure your main enemies will be happy the obstacle is pushed out but I'm happier for it and at the same time feel pity in the sense that you're living with enemies within. Sorry if you misconstrued my actions as a means of exploiting you but I've been there before you, walked the walk and not just talk the talk, so I know how it feels when you are paying too much and getting too little.

In real estates, there's no one to impress!

This seems very interesting but here is my take on this. As we all know you cannot get approval here in Lagos without Consent or CofO. That much is very clear so this poses a few questions which both parties need to answer. First of all Oga Maverick, you calling/talking to Brabus wife is not the right way to go. I understand your grievances and feel your pain but please let’s try and keep our families sacred. Same goes for Oga Egun. We all know that you come from a good family but please if you have any issues with Oga Brag3 or any member of his family, please settle it with directly.
There is no need for families to be tarnished or threatened by you good members.

Back to the issue at hand. Oga Brabus I have followed a few of your threads with great interest and I, like some others think you are doing a good job but some of your practices need to be questioned.

I, like others are not privy to what transpired between you and Oga Maverick but from what has been mentioned and counter-mentioned plus some of the screenshots and finally your reply here it seems that there has been some miscommunication/misunderstanding as to what the 400k was paid for. Now Oga Maverick insists that this was paid for approval. Something he claims you guaranteed but you on the other hand say that it was not paid for approval but to allow work to carry on uninterrupted on Maverick’s site from our lovely approval people (LASBCA).

So in essence the 400k was never for approval hence no receipts.

Oga Maverick, did you and Brabus meet this guy together? Was this agreed by all parties at the time?

Have you incurred any costs from LASBCA during this time?

Oga Brabus, I seem to recall another client a while back who made the same allegations and you said the same thing that it was not paid for approval but for clearing the way. I am glad you guys were able to settle but this seems like a pattern that needs to be corrected. I may be wrong here and apologies if I am but it seems like you are obtaining these fees on fake pretences of providing approvals which is not a good practice. It’s just fraud. Simple as that.

I am sure you, like others are constantly adapting your business models to suit our ever changing country so I am sure we won’t be hearing anymore of these types of allegations.

In the meantime, as many others have said you need to avoid such bad press by all means. It’s not good for business. You may think that you have a lot of clients on your books so you don’t care but for every bad press you get you are losing a lot of potential clients.
If Maverick knew that this was just to clear the way then sorry Oga Maverick the money is gone and we need to close this matter but if this was indeed paid on the proviso of approval being done then Oga Brabus you need to rightful thing and refund the amount (or some of it) and let this matter be put to bed. As it has been said above the amount is not that much so it should be easy for you guys to come to some amicable agreement.

This is my 50 cents on the matter.

brabus:
I guess since there's no comment so I can fire on.

The Approval Thingy

It's never my thing to get involved in anything documentation especially on projects where I didn't do the designs and drawings.
Everyone (including all engineers in the house) on the island knew how much the LASBCA guys do disturb sites without approvals and detailed representations.
So I clearly explained to my client Mr Maverrick that I'll prefer he get an approval document for the proposed development to avoid issues with the LASBCA guys prior to construction period. I've witnessed the task force operations before and ever since I've vouched not to have anything to do with them again. So, I told him I knew a guy on the island here who can help with securing approvals for the building. He works in the office and blah blah. The client even requested the guys number and they talked.
The first thing the guy told me was that there's no approval for the area by the govt yet but we can still go ahead to start the processing to avoid issues with those boys because they'll definitely come around. The guy said if there's anything or anyone that calls we should inform him and he'll be there to talk to them directly.

Now, when it comes to real approval. There's more to it than eye meets. No one can do the real approval on your behalf because of the processes and the requirements. And more importantly the Governors' consent or CofO. I asked for this details from Mr Maverrick and his response was that the consent was been processed. I can still remember when he visited Naija and I had to quickly drop a document for him at Ikota that he wants to take to Alausa for his consent.

The Big Question - Is the approval fake?

I can't really say Yes here because of the following:

1. The owner knew everything from the onset. No need to prove too much. There's possibility of forgetting some things. But our chat of on the 15th July 2015 on consent been turned back due to land falling on government acquisition and on 22nd July 2015 when LASBCA came to serve contravention order and mark X on the site should buttress the fact that payment was made to the guy to get us clearance while we get the necessary supporting documents to complete the approval. I can remember the discussion then was "Who came to mark X on the site?" "Isn't that what XYZ ought to have sorted?"

2. The built structure was 10m x 33m (6 units of 2 bed flats) but the drawing was scaled down to 10m x 21m (4 units of 2 bed flats) by the owner through his architect to get a lesser figure from the approval guy which is clear to us (Mr Maverrick, myself and the approval guy) all. The approval guy was also saddled with the responsibility of taking
care of any issues that may arise from the officials which he did without fail on both occasions when the officials came visiting.

It's pertinent to note that the client and the approval guy were having direct contact during the period. The only role I played was that I received and paid the money to the guy. And that I received the scaled down plan from the client and printed and handed over to the approval guy.

When the documents were delivered to the client, the approval guy delivered directly to the client and a photocopy was handed to me for site use by the client.

Ever since this issue was raised. The client has been in touch with the guy to the extent that the guy said he'll issue him a cover note or something which I'm really not clear about. That once his other documents are ready, he will complete the process. I told the client why put all the blame on me. We were all on this together. I never do a thing in isolation hence my reason for asking him to let us go to the office and fight dirty with the guy for defrauding us. At least maybe to clear my own name. But deep down, we both knew what was done. The scaled down building plan, the mandate given to the guy to clear up all issues from the boys that may come to disturb and the turned down consent which halts everything.

Let me rest here. If there's any question.