Not saying Chinese developer are all unsafe but to keep them safe, 150% vigilant checking on what they do. Otherwise, consequences will be very serious.
The person who posted this is Desmond Shum, a very successful and rich property developer. He has experience on the ground working with Chinese property developers.
“Trust but verify”? Not in China. Try: Never trust, always verify. So here’s what happened: During the recent Myanmar earthquake, a 33-story skyscraper in Bangkok suddenly decided to sit down (video attached) — permanently. This wasn’t some random building; it was the future home of Thailand’s Office of the Auditor General. Yes, the office in charge of checking that public money isn’t going up in smoke — or in this case, going down in rubble. It was the only high-rise in the city that collapsed, and Thai authorities are now scrambling to investigate what went wrong — construction quality, materials, earthquake resilience, the whole checklist. Now, allow me to offer a theory. As a former developer in China, I’ve worked with many Chinese builders— including China Railway Sixth, a close sibling of the company behind the Bangkok disaster, China Railway Tenth. I’ve seen this movie before, many times. And if there’s one rule that seasoned Chinese developers live by, it’s this: Every builder is guilty and there’s no exception. The only question is how to minimize the damage. In China, we owners don’t “collaborate” with builders — we shadow them like paranoid detectives. We have full in-house teams mirroring every function: site management, costing, engineering, architecture, etc…. Why? Because the minute you turn your back, someone’s bribing your staff, cutting corners, or quietly replacing steel with tofu. It’s not cynicism — it’s standard procedure. Trust isn’t just scarce — it’s a liability. Now contrast that with what happens in law-abiding societies. There, owners believe in contracts. They trust their builders. There’s good faith, accountability, and even — bless them — handshakes. So when a foreign owner from one of these trusting lands hires a Chinese builder without the paranoia goggles on? Well, this time the result wasn’t just a few cost overruns or dodgy plumbing. The whole damn building collapsed. And that, my friends, is what happens when you drop guanxi into a rule-of-law system — it short-circuits on contact, or in this case, collapses on site.
The person who posted this is Desmond Shum, a very successful and rich property developer. He has experience on the ground working with Chinese property developers.
“Trust but verify”? Not in China. Try: Never trust, always verify. So here’s what happened: During the recent Myanmar earthquake, a 33-story skyscraper in Bangkok suddenly decided to sit down (video attached) — permanently. This wasn’t some random building; it was the future home of Thailand’s Office of the Auditor General. Yes, the office in charge of checking that public money isn’t going up in smoke — or in this case, going down in rubble. It was the only high-rise in the city that collapsed, and Thai authorities are now scrambling to investigate what went wrong — construction quality, materials, earthquake resilience, the whole checklist. Now, allow me to offer a theory. As a former developer in China, I’ve worked with many Chinese builders— including China Railway Sixth, a close sibling of the company behind the Bangkok disaster, China Railway Tenth. I’ve seen this movie before, many times. And if there’s one rule that seasoned Chinese developers live by, it’s this: Every builder is guilty and there’s no exception. The only question is how to minimize the damage. In China, we owners don’t “collaborate” with builders — we shadow them like paranoid detectives. We have full in-house teams mirroring every function: site management, costing, engineering, architecture, etc…. Why? Because the minute you turn your back, someone’s bribing your staff, cutting corners, or quietly replacing steel with tofu. It’s not cynicism — it’s standard procedure. Trust isn’t just scarce — it’s a liability. Now contrast that with what happens in law-abiding societies. There, owners believe in contracts. They trust their builders. There’s good faith, accountability, and even — bless them — handshakes. So when a foreign owner from one of these trusting lands hires a Chinese builder without the paranoia goggles on? Well, this time the result wasn’t just a few cost overruns or dodgy plumbing. The whole damn building collapsed. And that, my friends, is what happens when you drop guanxi into a rule-of-law system — it short-circuits on contact, or in this case, collapses on site.
