2. Setting out plan and digging foundation pit

Kerala House Construction Tips: This is the approved building plan for the house. I preferred a simple house plan without complication. Rooms must be spacious. Avoid structural congestion. So I cut staircase inside from house plan. I cut sit out also. No one will sit there. It normally uses for putting chapels. A small change is done to the house plan. So the space for sit out is added to the hall. We planned for a simple living by reducing kitchen utensils etc. So I avoided work area from the house plan. (But latter we felt that it was a mistake). Two bed rooms are attached. The living and dining becomes a square big space without any separation between the two. So it looks spacious. 

Foundation for house construction.

Before digging foundation, we have to set out house plan on the plot by tying threads on several wooden posts. Special care to be given to calculate actual dimensions on the actual house plan, so that we will not have hard time getting small rooms than actual dimensions from approved plan. How much we have to dig depends on the type of soil on plot. Dig foundation pit till reaching a strong earth or hard soil. If the plot is with poor or loose soil then we have go deep. If there is water bed on plot then go for pillar foundation. This plot is with normal earth condition of strong structure. No water bed or poor soil. So two feet deep and two feet wide pit is taken for foundation. Sometimes people dig more than two feet. That depends on the quality of earth on plot.

setting out the house plan on plot

digging foundation pit

At the base part, a cement concrete is done. Foundation is coming over this metal concrete. Pour water for two days.

After completing this, started putting rubble (size-stone) on to the pit. No need to use cement mortar (ചാന്ത് ) to make foundation on such type of earth. Fortunately there were no need had come to arise pillars. That has reduced the cost for it.

Placing rocks on pit

Place rubble by filling gaps with stone pieces. If you prefer to do an extra care to foundation follow these steps:

After completing foundation work, fill gap with rock waste sand and inforce water onto it to fill the gap completely. This gives extra strength to foundation.

After finishing filling stones by two feet height, then put an even layer of cement plaster on top. It is better to water for two days before starting basement.

1. Plot for the proposed house

Kerala House Construction Tips: For construction of a house, the first thing to do is finding a good plot. Decide an area to build your dream home. Then do all efforts to get a nice plot for construction of house. Actually it is a tough task to decide on a plot. Sometimes you may go in confusion. Give some time for it.

Same way finally I found a nice plot for construction of a dream home. This plot is five cents. There are total 28 plots . I started house construction first. There was another party also started house construction along with this. After purchasing the plot and doing other legal formalities, the first step I did was to apply for a building permit for the construction pf the house from Panchayath/Corporation. Before this I prepared the house plan.

The raw land at first sight

Together with all these, I talked to few construction parties/ builders to do construction of house. I did not want to do house construction of my own. I thought it is very difficult to arrange masons and other labors. So I thought give total house construction work to a builder. After talking to few parties I finalized one. There were parties who quoted from 1500 to 1900 sq. ft. rate (2015). I did not go for the lowest rate. I selected 1800 sq. rate with clay brick or ishttika. Latter I chose cement solid block to construct my house. That way the sq. ft. rate reduced by 100 Rs.

Plot from front road

Electricity connection for construction

After getting building permit for the construction of house I applied for temporary electricity connection for construction work. By few weeks, electricity connection had received. Before that I checked to get water connection from Kerala water authority. But it seemed very expensive to take line from the main road. So I decided to dig an open well inside the five cents plot. With 8 or 9 days a 45  ft. open well was dug. ( The plot is situated in an elevated area.)

The construction party started construction of house by installing a pump set for their work. We had signed contract agreement before starting the house construction.

 You can read the setting out of plan on the plot and other details in the next post....