House For Sale?

I was walking over to the hardware store with my friend the other day and commenting on how some of the houses were really nice. They were mostly made of brick (some of corrugated tin) and many of those were plastered over and painted brightly. A vast majority of the houses have at least some grass which is not what I expected when I was coming here.

I also noticed that I didn't see ANY "house for sale" signs. During Pre-Service Training another trainee said something about Americans being a more transient society where we may move several times throughout our lives (I've lived for longer than 3 months in 5 different places). Rural South Africans are not transient. The men may leave for 3 months to a year to work in a mine, thus seeing his children and wife 1-4 times a year, but the family would never move.

The father bears ownership of the house. Once the father dies, his wife gains ownership. If she is no longer alive, the YOUNGEST son gains ownership of the house. If there is no son then the daughters own it. If there are no surviving children then anybody from the family can move in. People do not sell their houses.

A majority of houses and low-rise apartment buildings built in the U.S. have light wood-framed construction with vinyl siding, wooden shingles, or a brick facade. Since the wood used for framing the house cannot be exposed to weather through more than one freeze-thaw cycle without losing a lot of structural integrity it must be built quickly.

Since few people have the money to pay for a house in one payment, most people take out a mortgage and pay for it in 20 or 30 years. The advantages to this are you get to move in right away, your payments may be less than renting, and you will eventually own the house.

All houses that I've seen in rural South Africa are a combination of: brick or corrugated tin walls, corrugated tin or clay tile roofs, and dirt or concrete floors. Houses with brick walls rarely have dirt floors and the exterior walls are either bare brick or plastered and painted. Houses with corrugated tin walls never have clay tile roofs and sometimes have concrete floors. In some areas of Africa at higher elevations it does snow so some people live in rondavels. Rondavels are cylindrical brick buildings with conical grass thatched roofs which are far warmer.

Since the structural materials are all water proof (the window frames are even made of steel) and there is no freeze-thaw cycle in my area, they can be built over several years; which is in fact how it is done. The advantages to this are that there isn't a monthly payment and when it is built it is completely paid for.

Since employment is often hard to come by and income is not always steady people can't afford to pay a monthly mortgage and many would default on their loans. As people get money they build a new part of their house. Some houses have just a foundation, half-built walls, window frames with no glass, or finished walls with no roof.

My closest friend's house has all of the brick walls built with a tile roof and is almost finished with the ceiling. He still needs to finish the ceiling, install the rest of the glass on the windows, and install burglar bars in the windows and on the porch. Eventually he will get running water which can only be achieved by having a jojo which is like a mini water tower that is filled by a tap.

He started making the bricks out of cement and sand that he is going to use to build a fence around his house yesterday. Every house has a fence around it; it could be a tin shack with with a fence made from wooden sticks and metal poles held up by barbed wire, there will be a fence.

He plans to have finished all of this by September of next year; he started 6 years ago. After that is finished he will knock down the tin shack behind the house that contains the kitchen and living room and his mother and sister and her two kids' bedroom and build a new building in its place.

At the end of those two years, he will own a house that is completely paid for. And some day, his wife, son, daughter or family member will own it.