Very nice house but...

[Hammers]

...84 bucks? Seems rather stiff, doesn't it? Are Miniature Building Authority generally more expensive than other companies? A large factory from Empress is £35. That's about $50, innit?

[Furt]

That house is particularly nice - but $84!

The railing and enclosed balcony at rear would be hard to reproduce unfortunately.

[joroas]

PMC on ebay do a painted table ready set of 7 buildings for £50:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/25MM-28MM-WARGAMES-ARAB-TUNISIAN-MIDDLE-EAST-TOWN-/270672123215?pt=UK_Toys_Wargames_RL&hash=item3f0550d54f

[Wirelizard]

Railing like that could be done nicely with laser-cut plywood to add to scratchbuilds; wonder if Litko or one of the other laser-cutter-wielding folks would consider it?

If I actually had a gaming budget right now, I'd consider approaching them about it; I've done a whole tableful of generic adobe buildings and details like that would nicely take them up a notch.

[JollyBob]

I'm sure Malamute made something very similar for his Zorro game. Probably cost about £3.50 in material and maybe 10 hours work?

[Hammers]

I'm sure Malamute made something very similar for his Zorro game. Probably cost about £3.50 in material and maybe 10 hours work?

Oh, I am not in to buy anything, especially not at those prices. I am just scanning the market.

[Furt]

PMC on ebay do a painted table ready set of 7 buildings for £50:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/25MM-28MM-WARGAMES-ARAB-TUNISIAN-MIDDLE-EAST-TOWN-/270672123215?pt=UK_Toys_Wargames_RL&hash=item3f0550d54f

That's actually quite a nice looking collection and very reasonably priced.

I have seen a lot worse for a lot more.

[JollyBob]

Oh, I am not in to buy anything, especially not at those prices. I am just scanning the market.

Sure, I was just saying (clumsily) that it's possible to build something very similar yourself for a fraction of the cost, so this really is extortionate.

[sepoy1857]

Yes MBA are very expensive...but then again they do come pre-painted. I wish they offered them un-painted as I like to paint my own.

[dbsubashi]

MBA buildings usually come with lift-off roofs ans painted interiors as well. But you pay for all of that...

[Geudens]

That's actually quite a nice looking collection and very reasonably priced.
I have seen a lot worse for a lot more.

Don't get me wrong; I have about 100 PMC prepainted buildings myself (mainly framework houses bought at £9.99-£19.99 let alone other PMC stuff...) but this is a typical something one can do in an afternoon (or a day at the most, painted and all) if you set up a production line using cork and some urethane items from the craft shop.

I'm currently building up for Nam games (28mm) and needed a village (hooches).  Based on Matakishi's idea, I have built a pilot model, but a bit more elaborated:






I never worked with cork before (it's great to cut, thanks Mata!), so concept, building and painting took me about 2.5 hours.  I'm confident I can make a village in a day (which  - in resin - would have set me back £ 100 without shipping, that's a lot of figures). I made this Arab village with lift-off roofs in one day ( made from that white architect's stuff 5 years ago):



It still needs a repaint (it's too light, so one of these days I'll let it pass under a Warpainter spraycan).  An option worth considering.  I haven't done this for budget reasons (I have also little enough hobby time as it is), but some things just can be done cheaper by oneself.

Rudi

[Belgian]

Neat houses! I really love the look of them. 

They will look outstanding on the tabletop!

[Hobbit]

I'm in the process of trying to build some houses for a Cairo street scene and having done a bit of research found that most of the houses had these very same enclosed balconies. After much thought I came up with a very simple foamcore frame. Next is to clad it in some stripwood or strips of card cut into appropriate patterns and then get some mesh (the latter is the real sticking point). At first glance these look quite tricky but in practice a re quite simple to put together.

My buildings are basically modelled on these watercolours:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:1907_in_Egypt

[Svennn]

Rudi, move into real estate - with those models of yours and MBA prices you will be quids (gilders) in

[Malamute]

I'm sure Malamute made something very similar for his Zorro game. Probably cost about £3.50 in material and maybe 10 hours work?

Yes, I did, here it is:



The reason why Jolly Bob remembers so well is he was playing Zorro in the game.

He leapt up onto the balcony did a bit of fancy sword play with the dastardly governor and then snogged his daughter ( who was sadly not the most fetching lady in town at the time, but he didn't seem to care...)