THIS PHASE IS DONE!

Since our last update in March, many of you contributed towards this project and we just want to thank each one of you for your generosity in helping us reach our goal. As you may remember, our goal was to get the property “job site ready” by rebuilding our perimeter walls and finishing any needed excavation work. With your help we were able to bring this phase of our project to completion. It took some time to arrive here but we are “JOB SITE READY”! You can visit our photo gallery via our website www.brazilforchrist.com to see all of the pictures of the property. Now, we are ready to move on to the second phase of development. We are ready to build!

We want to start this next phase of this fundraiser emphasizing that we are just trying to get a simple structure put into place where we can hold meetings. If we start off with the basics, what do we need? Two things we HAVE TO HAVE: 1. Bathrooms and 2. Covered and Enclosed area for meetings. It doesn’t have to be super nice; it just has to keep people in from the weather and a place for people to use the restroom. We do have a master-plan for our project and so what we build will not have to be torn down later on to make room for something else, we will simply modify it and integrate it into any future development.

We are still putting together a list of estimates and studying the cheapest way to build what we need and soon we hope to be able to present all of that to you.

Over the next couple of months we are going to be purchasing basic building materials as funds are available and stock them on the property. We will be mostly buying 6” and 8” blocks, pavers, sand, stone, and some tools. These are durable goods that we can begin purchasing now to be “ahead of the game” later. The main reason we are doing this is to take advantage of the current high in the exchange rate. As many of you know the U.S. Dollar has fluctuated 25% in the last 18 months – it rose 25% and then dropped 25% in that period. Imagine trying to set a budget for a project under those circumstances.

I could save the contributed money and cash it in for building materials IF the exchange rate jumps or I could end up saving the money for a high exchange and it never come around and then I’d be forced to exchange funds at a low rate at a time that I really needed materials. The best plan is buy materials as funds are available and thus getting the “median advantage” of the exchange rate. Within the last month the U.S. Dollar has gone up about 10%, it may gone down tomorrow or it may continue to rise. I don’t know but one thing is for sure, if I buy over time I’ll get the average of the highs and lows.

Example of how the exchange rate affects our budget:

1000 - 8” Cement Block:

One Month Ago $1515 vs. Today $1366

This is just one example but the principle applies to every single item we have to purchase. I may say we need a certain amount for a project today and that amount may not be enough tomorrow. So, we are asking you to consider giving towards these building materials.

Go to our picture page to see the progress...Web Album

Almost Built

A few months ago you helped us reach our financial goal to build some deteriorating perimeter walls on part of our property. As you may remember, our goal was (and is) to get the property “job site ready” and for us that means to secure the property with strong perimeter walls (just what you have to do in Brazil) and finish any needed excavation work (a slight grade is also normal in Sao Paulo’s terrain – grade seen in the second picture).
Well, the wall is being built and at present we have finished 70% of the work on the wall. How big is this wall we’re building? Well, it is roughly 100 meters long x 2.2 meters high. That’s 328 ft. long x 7.2 ft. high or 2,368 sq. ft. of wall. That’s a lot of wall! That’s a lot of 8” block!
We were off on our building cost estimates. We had to put more money into the footer and steel (rebar) than we expected due to the poor soil quality – better to build it right once than to build it wrong and have to do it again!
So, we are asking you to consider giving towards this same project to help us finish off this phase of the work that needs done.

Go to our picture page to see the progress... Web Album