OK, so I went to this website because I was looking at some picture and I was curious what it said.
http://www.expatexchange.com/lib_rd.cfm?articleid=2621&networkid=96 But I ended up just being offended. I'm sure he had some idea of prices in the area that he looked at living in, but then he was off on a when a good deal of the housing was built. [At the time he wrote that, I had just left.]
I think he must have been fairly fresh off the boat and just found a place to live. I paid a decent price and lived in a building with no "exposed plumbing", etc. I saw places that had that, but lived in a very nice part of town--and still at a better price than he quoted.
I'm just not sure how people can talk out of their a$$e$ and publish this kind of advice.
Not just that, but it's supposed to be advice and it ends up being stupid stuff. Seriously, the writer should have better information to give on that particular subject. It's just pathetic.