Expanding the network

Finding builders / designers outside my own batch of contacts

Bali is an entrepreneur’s paradise. There are restrictions of course but if you want to get something done in Bali, you find the people who know people who can makes things happen.

It’s not uncommon to meet someone who has lived in Bali for let’s say 15 years who speaks 5 languages, has or had businesses in other parts of the world, and is leveraging connections worldwide for his Bali projects.

One guy, Ivan, was in private aviation in Switzerland for 25 years. He arranged flights for heads of state, CEOs etc and held on to their contact info. Now he sells custom villas to them in Bali, and ships crates of furniture he and his wife creates to Europe.

Meet Luis:

Just a year younger than me, at 62, Luis is a Brazilian who speaks 7 languages, builds custom villas, and also creates furniture for foreign markets. As you can see there’s a pattern here. People who are at ease being globetrotters settle on an island (Bali) known as one of the top five global destinations in the world — and inevitably find ways of utilizing what they’ve been doing for the last 2 decades.

Luis is building a private villa on the edge of a hill, overlooking a small river and forest. He’s a courageous fellow, to say the least. His customer, from Dubai, at first couldn’t believe he’d be able to do it, but its coming together on time and on budget.

Luis spent time showing me a few pieces of land in his neighborhood that are for lease. As I previously mentioned, the two main choices are leasing land (typically for 30 years), or buying freehold land but then registering it under an Indonesian citizen.

I’m in favor of freehold land, as there’s never a guarantee that the lease will be renewed. In the past it was cheaper to lease land, but now with the coronavirus creating an economic crisis, land can be bought for roughly half its value. Of course if tourism doesn’t return then even half the “normal” value would be way too high. But I’m confident we will get a vaccine and tourism will return (possibly stronger than ever) within the next 2 years.

Luis showed me his process for building and I like what he’s able to accomplish. He’s been a furniture designer and seller for a long time and he has chosen a Balinese builder that can tackle big challenges.

Even though I may not lease land near him (the locals from his village shy away from selling land), I may use his expertise when we start designing and building our own community.

Later,

Neill