Villa / house

In Roman times, villas were large estates consisting of buildings around a courtyard and later were typically large, luxury free standing houses within large roaming gardens.  This definition has somewhat expanded over time and now, ‘villa’ can refer to a large home with a garden (of varying sizes). Today, many developers try to reconstruct the grandeur of the former times and they offer a variety of options starting at $100,000 with some in excess of $10 million. Boreys (gated communities) have many types for every budget, with a range of options – flat houses, shop front and villa style. Some offer club houses, swimming pools, on site retail and children’s play areas and most have on site staff for garbage collection, security and common area maintenance. Although the villa has changed over time, they bring back the halcyon days of the French era. They give the average Khmer family a taste of what this southeast Asian city would have been like.