Buying a house/condo for your Filipina's family

[BC57]

17 hours ago, Gandang Smile said:

Just last night I caught up with a friend who is married to a Filipina. They used to rent a condo in the Alabang area. Then she started to convince him to buy a lot and build a "love nest" (a house) for the two of them and their future kids. After almost a year of work the 4BR home is ready, on a pretty nice scenic spot overlooking the Laguna. He spent 3M for the plot and more than 10M for the house. Two large gardens, swimming pool, small plunge pool with Laguna view just outside the master bedroom...quite the lap of luxury.

They were making plans to finally settle there and enjoy their "love nest", when the girl starts whining that living in the Philippines "isn't safe" and she would like to go living in Germany, where her husband is from. After a couple of months of negotiation they agree to move back to Germany. He runs a publishing company (started by his father), so he has a guaranteed job anyway. They spend a few weeks looking for a potential buyer for the house. Nobody comes forward.

That's when she suggests him to let her family look for a suitable buyer, so they can finish their preparations and move back to Germany. They finally move and months, indeed almost a year, pass. He starts enquiring as to whether her family has found a buyer and is met with radio silence. More months go by and he randomly meets a neighbour on chat. Said neighbour gives him the (not so) surprising news: her wife's entire family had moved into his house en-masse. Wife's parents, 2 siblings, 2 grandparents, cousin with husband and a small child. 9 people living in the house for free for more than a year. When asked, wife pretends she knows nothing, then bursts into tears and tells him that it was never her intention to live in Alabang. Her family forced her to convince him to build a house for them.

I think that, by now, my friend has given up the idea of making any profits from his 13M property. He is too good-hearted to kick wife's family out, and, as he said, too accustomed to life in Germany to be back to the Philippines for good.

I told him, as politely as I could, that if I was him I would have lost all respect towards J, his wife, and would have considered divorcing her and sending her back home. He actually told me he contemplated it but - hey presto! - now she's pregnant with their first child and he doesn't have the heart to "ruin her life".

Now, this is not the first story I hear, along these lines. I know at least 4 foreigners who bought or built a home that was supposed to be for them and their partners, only to find out their partner's family had moved in, perhaps with an excuse, and basically living a better life 100% rent free.

It's very Filipino to put family first, to help family members in need, yet I fail to understand why these massive acts of life-changing generosity have to be extorted, rather than given willingly and with pleasure.

Have you guys heard of similar experiences?    

Your friend needs to get rid of the wife. He can find a better match for him now that he is familiar with the family scam and how to avoid it. His wife knew exactly what she was doing!!! I just couldn't stay with someone that did that to me no matter how long we were together.

[graham59]

Next....DNA test ? 

[Snowy79]

3 hours ago, BC57 said:

Your friend needs to get rid of the wife. He can find a better match for him now that he is familiar with the family scam and how to avoid it. His wife knew exactly what she was doing!!! I just couldn't stay with someone that did that to me no matter how long we were together.

It never fails to amaze me how many guys get screwed over in the West after many years being happily married then come here and get screwed over in the first year or two. 

As I've highlighted I try to keep out of it now as it just costs friendships. I think in today's age if an ex pat was to take his time many would think twice about marriage. I've been about the bush long enough to see what goes on here and have a few female friends that pretty much open up to me what is going on.

I'm friends with both of my ex girlfriends and touch wood have found a decent one now.  I knew her as a friend for a year and full checked her and her family out.  Never had a foreign boyfriend but had many trying to entice her with money, houses and taking her West etc. She knocked everyone back as she said her family would disown her.  Two years down the line her family haven't asked for a peso and she has proven to be a keeper. 

In the same two years I've known personally about 6 women screw their partners over and have had it second hand from a couple of others that their friends are currently screwing their partners.  Even with my current partner one foreigner who was chasing her for 6 months got screwed over.

My partner who was just a friend at the time kept telling me about a Polish guy who was after her.  He wanted marriage and promised to take her back to Poland and maintain her family. She basically told him where to go and within two weeks he had a new girlfriend from the same town, three months later she was off to Poland to join him.  I checked the girl out and she got about a bit to say the least.  Two weeks after arrival in Poland she left during the night and is living with a German guy who she had been talking to all along. So in short anyone that buys land and property for someone they hardly know deserves everything that they get. 

[Old55]

So the consensus is.... don't buy or become married instead rent? 

Edited June 26, 2021 by Old55

[Gandang Smile]

18 hours ago, Mike J said:

Damn, that is a sad story.  My wife wanted to buy and/or build a house for her parents that would become the "ancestral home".  I agreed to do that but only if both the land and the house were in my wife's name.  At first she was upset and wanted it to "belong" to the parents.  I seldom put my foot down but this was "your own it and they can live there or no house".  We bought 1247 square meters and built them a nice two bedroom house.  After living here several years now and dealing with her family she understands the wisdom of having it in her name.  It is actually conjugal property, but we will not have to fight with siblings when the parents pass.

A very, very wise choice @Mike J. To most Filipino families, any act of mistrust towards the gf/wife's family is seen as an incredible affront...until a mother, brother or sister starts laying their claims and all of a sudden said gf/wife is struck with the obvious: that in front of money, or a property, everybody is playing on their own.  

Edited June 26, 2021 by Gandang Smile

[Gandang Smile]

4 hours ago, BC57 said:

Your friend needs to get rid of the wife. He can find a better match for him now that he is familiar with the family scam and how to avoid it. His wife knew exactly what she was doing!!! I just couldn't stay with someone that did that to me no matter how long we were together.

1) He is a Catholic and wouldn't wanna do it

2) He is deeply in love with her

3) She is now pregnant

I would have taken the matter more seriously. All I can say on his defence is that he seems to be quite well off, so 13M to him doesn't seem to be a too large sum to make her inlaws happy. 

Edited June 26, 2021 by Gandang Smile

[hk blues]

1 hour ago, Old55 said:

So the consensus is.... don't buy or become married instead rent? 

I'm not sure about that. If I look at this forum first, and then all around me next, I see more examples of stable relationships than not. I'm excluding the 'dodgy' ones because they aren't what we are discussing in this topic, so bad guy scewing around with bad girl getting screwed over is kinda fair game IMO. 

GS raised this issue to elicit opinion, and that's fair, but for every lousy situation mentioned there has to be 10 more good ones. In short, the exception isn't the rule, it simply proves it.

I'll also throw into the ring the point that I think it's fair to say a high percentage of us guys here aren't at our 1st rodeo (I'm one) so clearly the Philippines doesn't have the monopoly on marital strife.

[hk blues]

17 hours ago, Shady said:

Probably looks like 3m now

Well, as sure as eggs are eggs, it won't be 14m!

[Gandang Smile]

2 hours ago, hk blues said:

I'm not sure about that. If I look at this forum first, and then all around me next, I see more examples of stable relationships than not. I'm excluding the 'dodgy' ones because they aren't what we are discussing in this topic, so bad guy scewing around with bad girl getting screwed over is kinda fair game IMO. 

GS raised this issue to elicit opinion, and that's fair, but for every lousy situation mentioned there has to be 10 more good ones. In short, the exception isn't the rule, it simply proves it.

I'll also throw into the ring the point that I think it's fair to say a high percentage of us guys here aren't at our 1st rodeo (I'm one) so clearly the Philippines doesn't have the monopoly on marital strife.

By my experience, the ones who got into a good relationships are generally the ones who knew to look beyond a petite, slim tanned body and check things like: how hard-working and humble she and her immediate family is, if her only dream is to get all loved up and get lazy, or she wants to "go places", etc.

Those who exercise this extra measure of common sense are usually those who are blessed by stable, loving and fulfilling relationships. Of course people change and a good apple may become rotten later in life. Yet, as with all things in life, it's all about mitigating risk, not removing it altogether. 

[hk blues]

1 hour ago, Gandang Smile said:

By my experience, the ones who got into a good relationships are generally the ones who knew to look beyond a petite, slim tanned body and check things like: how hard-working and humble she and her immediate family is, if her only dream is to get all loved up and get lazy, or she wants to "go places", etc.

Those who exercise this extra measure of common sense are usually those who are blessed by stable, loving and fulfilling relationships. Of course people change and a good apple may become rotten later in life. Yet, as with all things in life, it's all about mitigating risk, not removing it altogether. 

I don't disagree with your sentiment, but you make it sound like an interview GS!

We're all different but as fully grown men we should be able to sort different partners into different groups naturally - there are ones for fun and then others for a relationship. 

I hate to be blunt but I have next to no sympathy for the guy who doesn't see what every other guy around them does. I wonder if the same guys were equally oblivious in their own countries - I suspect yes.

Worse thing is they give the rest of us a bad name, or at least set expectation levels way beyond where they should be.

Living in Hong Kong for 10 years I saw it magnified and undiluted with the western ex-pats and Filipina domestic helpers. It was both pathetic and comical in equal measure.