Villa construction
Villa construction in Canggu, and across Bali.
One contract, one team, one person accountable from the first permit to the day you get the keys.
Fidé Estate builds villas in Canggu, Pererenan, Seseh, Cemagi, Kerobokan, Karangasem, Buleleng, Uluwatu and Kedungu. We handle the land checks, the design, the permits, the build and the handover under a single contract, so there is one team responsible for the outcome instead of a dozen contractors blaming each other.
Every build runs on a fixed scope, a real schedule and open-book cost reporting. You get weekly photos and video from site, so you know what happened this week and what it cost, whether you are in Canggu or ten thousand miles away.
- 21
- Projects completed
- 7
- Projects under construction
- 12 months
- Average construction time
- 7+
- Services under one roof
Three ways to build in Bali
All three genuinely work. They suit different people, and it is worth being honest about which one you are.
| Separate contractors | Local contractor | Fidé | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who is accountable | You are. Every gap between trades is yours to catch. | The contractor, for the build only. Design and permits are yours. | One team, for the whole outcome. |
| What it costs | Cheapest on paper. Overruns land on you. | Low day rate. Extras are where the cost arrives. | Higher up front, fixed scope, fewer surprises. |
| Design and build alignment | Drawn by one firm, priced by another. Gaps get expensive. | Often built from sketches, decided on site. | Drawn and priced by the same team, so what is drawn is what is built. |
| If you live abroad | Hard. Someone has to be on site, and it ends up being you. | Depends entirely on trust and WhatsApp. | Weekly photo and video reporting, Western and Balinese managers on site. |
| Permits and compliance | Your problem. | Usually your problem. | Ours. |
| Best for | Experienced developers already in Bali with time to manage. | Small, simple builds where you can be on site often. | Owners who want one accountable team and a villa that lasts. |
What we have actually built
Completed projects across Canggu, Pererenan, Seseh, Cemagi, Kerobokan, Karangasem, Buleleng, Uluwatu and Kedungu, including two restaurants, with more under construction. Not renders. Finished buildings that people live in, rent out and have sold on.
We build for what quietly ruins villas in Bali rather than what photographs well: waterproofing, foundations and humidity. Years with the same contractors give us the leverage to hold them to a standard they would not hit on their own, and Western and Balinese managers check every stage on the ground.
When we are the wrong choice
We would rather tell you now than three months into a build that was never going to suit you.
- You want the cheapest possible build. We are not it, and we will lose that comparison every time. If price is the deciding factor, a local contractor will beat us on the quote.
- You want to manage the build yourself and just need labour. That works, and plenty of people do it well. Going direct to a local contractor is genuinely the better choice if you know building here inside out, you have been on the ground a long time, and you are willing to do your own due diligence. Worth saying plainly: all four of us used a consultant or a developer on our own first builds before we started working with contractors directly. That is how you learn it.
- You want to start on site next week. Land checks and permits take as long as they take, and skipping them is how people end up with something they are not allowed to keep.
- You want something we specifically do not do. Most often that is a deliberately low-cost, low-quality build: we can build to whatever budget and materials you choose, but we will not put our name to a result we do not believe in, and we would rather say so now than take the job and undercut it.
The questions we actually get asked
- What does it cost to build a villa in Bali?
- We have completed projects from US$150,000 up into the millions of dollars, and land cost sits separately on top of that. There is no single per-square-metre figure that means much on its own: the lower you push the build budget, the harder it is to hit a standard we are willing to put our name to. A real number for your project comes from your brief, your plot and your finish level, which is what the first call is for.
- What about land cost?
- Separate from the build, and it moves far more than the build does. Leasehold starts around Rp 1 million per are per year in areas nobody is fighting over, and runs above Rp 100 million per are per year in central Canggu or on the beach at Seminyak. Most of the plots our clients actually buy sit between Rp 15 and 40 million per are per year. To put that in real money, Rp 15 million is roughly A$1,200 for 100 square metres for a year, so a thirty year lease on that plot is that figure thirty times over. Freehold is a different conversation again, from around Rp 30 million per are up to Rp 3 billion per are in central Canggu. We scope land cost against your budget before you commit to a plot, not after.
- Does it cost more to build outside Canggu?
- Barely. We have a site in Buleleng, four hours from the middle of Bali, that cost no more to build than the same villa would have in Canggu. A genuinely remote site adds up to about 10 percent, and that is transporting materials, not a lower standard or a slower crew. What changes between Canggu and the north coast is the price of the land, not the price of the building.
- How long does a villa take to build?
- Ten to fourteen months from breaking ground to handing you the keys. Most land on twelve. We write contracts at twelve to fourteen so there is room for the things that go wrong, and we have delivered in nine or ten when a site is straightforward. We are not doing eighteen month villa projects. That length only applies to a hotel or ten villas at once. Permits do not usually add to that, because we can normally get started straight away.
- How do you charge?
- One price for your villa, and that is the price. We do not quote you a build and then bill a percentage on top, and you never see a management fee as a separate line. The builders are contracted to us, not to you, so you are dealing with one party. The only thing that sits outside that price is anything you ask us to source for you, marble, cabinetry, air conditioning, a sound system, a sauna. We can often beat what a subcontractor would charge you for those, so we handle them on a side agreement and you decide whether you want that or not. Most people want turnkey and that is what we deliver.
- When do I pay, and how do I know the work is actually done?
- In five or six instalments, roughly 20, 20 and 15 percent. At 40 percent complete you pay the next 20. Before each payment you get a progress report with photographs, plus our own assessment made independently of the contractor. If you want your own architect on site checking the same thing, that is welcome and we will arrange it.
- What happens if the build goes over budget?
- You are on a fixed price, so an increase in the cost of the scoped work is ours to absorb, not yours. What moves the number is you changing your mind. If you pull something out mid build, or swap it for something dearer, the builder priced the whole job as a whole and that change takes his profit out of it, so he has to be compensated. That is the supplier's invoice plus a percentage. It is much cheaper to have that conversation before we start than halfway up, and we will tell you so at the time.
- What stops the builder taking my money and disappearing?
- It is the honest fear and it is not paranoia, it happens here and it happens at the bottom of the price range in particular. Three big villas at US$100,000 each will either be full of problems or end with the builder gone, because there is no profit in it for him to stay. Our answer is years of due diligence on every contractor we use, including building with our own money on our own projects before we put a client with them. Most of this job is holding a relationship and enough repeat work that nobody wants to lose it. If it ever did happen, we have another contractor on site inside two weeks, or we run the project ourselves through our own subcontractors. And your payment schedule means the money still in your pocket is the money the work has not reached yet.
- Can I watch the build from abroad?
- Yes, and most of our owners do. You get weekly photos and video from site, plus cost reporting you can actually read. Owners who live abroad routinely know more about their build than people living ten minutes away.
- Can a foreigner legally own what you build?
- You can hold it safely, but not always in the way you first assume. It depends on the structure, usually a PT PMA or a leasehold, and on the land being clean and correctly zoned before you buy. We check all of that up front, and if a plot will not work we tell you before you buy it rather than after.
- Do you build outside Canggu?
- Yes. We have completed projects in Pererenan, Seseh, Cemagi, Kerobokan, Karangasem, Buleleng (Sumberkima Hill), Uluwatu and Kedungu, and we can work in most of the rest of Indonesia too. If a specific site is not right for us we will say so, but location on its own is rarely the reason.
Full 2026 build costs, land prices per are and what moves the number are on our Bali build cost page.
Tell us what you're planning.
A 20-minute call is enough to tell you whether your plot works, roughly what it should cost, and how we would run it. No obligation, and no pressure if the answer is that we are not the right fit.