Buying a condo in the Philippines being an OFW. Big Mistake.

I came to the Philippines from Dubai for a one-month vacation in 2012. One day, while I was walking in a shopping mall, I was convinced to invest in a condominium unit that was being built at the time. I made a reservation fee of PHP 20,000 as a security deposit, and I agreed to pay PHP 10,000 per month for two years. 

 

I went back to Dubai, and after two years, I had completed the monthly payments. In 2015, I returned to the Philippines because the condominium was ready for occupancy. However, with the assistance of my real estate agent, I still needed to apply for a home financing loan from a bank. At the time, my annual salary was not sufficient to meet the bank's lending limits, so my application was not approved. 

Because of this, I decided not to continue with the purchase of the condominium unit. I did not feel any hard feelings, and I returned to Dubai. The real estate company gave me back 50% of my deposit, which was equivalent to the PHP 10,000 monthly payments that I had made over two years.

The money that they returned to me was what I used to pay for the expenses of going to Australia, such as gathering documents, applying for a visa, and other related costs. I also used it to travel to Europe and Southeast Asia. If I had pursued buying the house, I probably would not have been able to go to Australia and would have had to stay in Dubai to work and pay for the house for 25 years.