A two-storey house with a deep brise-soleil over the upper floor

Building a house herewhen you live somewhere else

You are eight thousand kilometres away, three time zones out, and everyone on site says everything is fine. Here is how to run that job so it is actually true.

Fix the design and the money before you leave. Insist on a dated photographic record at every stage, not a weekly phone call. Appoint one person who is accountable for the whole house. Never approve a material from a screen — send a family member, or have the sample couriered.

Distance does not create new problems. It removes the thing that normally catches them: somebody walking the site who knows what it should look like.

Everything below exists to replace that walk.

Settle these before you fly back

The four things distance punishes hardest

An unfinished drawing set. Anything left open will be decided by whoever is on site that day.
An open material schedule. Substitutions happen quietly when nobody is there to see the sample.
A vague scope. Get inclusions and exclusions in writing. Exclusions are where remote budgets break.
Split responsibility. If design, structure and interiors sit with three firms, the gaps are yours to manage at 2am.

Ask for a record, not reassurance

A weekly video call tells you how somebody feels about the work. A dated photograph of the steel before the pour tells you what was actually built. Ask for the second one.

The record that protects a remote client is boring and specific: the same stages, photographed the same way, every time — steel before concrete, the slab during curing, the ponding test, the walls before plaster, the conduits before they disappear.

The nine moments worth insisting on are the same nine any owner should check, and they are listed in nine checks before you pay the next bill.

A deep verandah carried on turned columns

How the money should work

Pay against completed stages, not against dates or against trust. Each release should be tied to something you can see in a photograph and that somebody has signed.

This is the single biggest protection available to a client who cannot visit. It also removes the most common source of tension, because nobody has to judge whether “about 60 per cent” is fair.

Ask for costs presented stage by stage, with exclusions written as clearly as inclusions. Where we execute, the work is costed against a bill of quantities you can compare line by line — see civil execution.

Building this year

Send us the plot or the plan. We will tell you what it will really take, in writing, before you commit to anything.

Start a conversation

Materials: the one thing that cannot be done remotely

Stone, tile, timber and hardware cannot be approved from a photograph. Colour shifts, the edge is invisible, and weight tells you nothing on a screen.

Two things work. Send a family member to hold the sample in daylight, or have the samples couriered to you before the order goes out. Both cost less than a floor you dislike for twenty years.

Plan two visits, and plan them around stages

If you can come twice, come at material selection and at snagging. Those are the two moments where being physically present changes the outcome most.

If you can only come once, come for snagging, and close the list with your own eyes.

Can you handle approvals and utilities while I am abroad?

Where we execute, yes — sanction, water, power and occupancy support are part of the scope and are filed on a written programme, not left to the end.

How often will I actually hear from you?

Stage by stage rather than by calendar. You get a dated photographic record at each checked stage, and a call whenever a decision needs you. We would rather contact you when it matters than send a report nobody reads.

Who signs things when I cannot?

Somebody you nominate, in writing, before work starts — usually a family member in the city. What we will not do is take a verbal approval on a material and proceed.

We are in a very different time zone. Is that a problem?

Not if decisions are scheduled instead of urgent. Almost every decision on a house can wait twelve hours. The ones that cannot are the ones that should already have been drawn.

Do you work in Goa and Kerala too?

Yes. Most of our work is in and around Hyderabad, and we have completed houses in Goa and Kerala. Travel and site-visit frequency are agreed at appointment, in writing.

Written by the studio. To talk about any of this against a real site, get in touch.