10 million baht is enough for a Thai golden visa, along with approximately 75 square meters of property in Bangkok. Or a condo around the same size with an ocean view in Phuket.
Gathering the Documents
You must obtain several documents before applying for a Thailand investment visa. Many of these are easy to get while others are a headache.
First, you need a foreign exchange transaction form (FET) from the seller’s bank. FETs serve as proof that you transferred 10 million baht from abroad. Any reputable real estate developer should do the legwork and easily give you the form.
Next, you must get a government appraisal which involves going to the city’s (or in in Bangkok, the district’s) land office. Land offices already have them on record and can usually provide it within one day.
Last, you’ll need the condo’s residence book, its title deed, and transfer tax receipt. The land office should have already given you those three documents when you initially bought the condo.
The requirements are more straightforward if you put ten million baht into a fixed deposit. Just show an FET and a bank statement proving your investment.
Apart from the obvious things like passport pictures along with a few copies, you’re now ready to apply for a Thai investor visa.
Renewing Your Golden Visa: Don’t Let it Expire!
Unfortunately, the bureaucracy doesn’t end after you’re approved for a Thai investment visa. You’ll first receive a visa with an initial 90-day validity using the process described above.
Afterwards, you must take the same set of documents to immigration again in order to within two weeks of its expiration date. You’ll then get the full one-year visa.
Thailand’s investor visa is a de-facto permanent residence. You can indefinitely extend it for another one-year as long as you maintain the original ten million baht worth of real estate, bonds, or deposits.
However, you still have to ensure your visa is maintained. It requires showing up at the immigration office annually at approximately the same time each year, within two weeks of your visa’s expiration date.
Your investment residence visa will expire if it’s not extended again each year before its expiration date.
This might prove difficult for anyone who travels a lot and doesn’t plan on living in Thailand full-time. Not everyone can be in Thailand for a specific two-week period each year.
One more thing: Thailand does have a history of changing the criteria for its investor visa. However, they also have a record of “grandfathering in” those who were approved under any previous requirements.
For example, the investment visa originally had a three million baht minimum several decades ago. It was changed to 10 million baht in back the early 2000s.
However, some people have lived in Thailand ever since then by extending their original visa with the initial requirements.
It’s a whole different story if you let your visa expire though. You’ll have to start from the very beginning and meet any new criteria.
Is Thai Residency by Investment Right for You?
Quite frankly, Thailand’s property investment visa isn’t a good deal when compared to other countries in Southeast Asia.
That’s not simply an opinion. Let’s quickly look at some other golden visa programs in nearby Asian countries, and compare them with Thailand’s from an objective point of view
Malaysia and its MM2H program have three different options. They’ll give you a 5-year renewable visa for RM500,000 (about $100,000) in a term deposit, a 15-year visa for RM2 million ($400,000), or immediate permanent residence for RM5 million ($1 million).
Plus, unlike in Thailand, other countries in Asia allow foreigners to legally own land under their own name.
Likewise, the Philippines has a retirement visa that only requires US$50,000 deposited at a local bank, with an age requirement of 50 years old.
Granted, not everyone wants to live in Malaysia or the Philippines full-time. Thailand has a unique charm to it.
Is your main goal to live in Thailand permanently? Are you below the minimum retirement age of 50? If you answered “yes” to both questions, Thai residency by investment is a clear choice.
Otherwise, consider looking at other options besides the Thai investor visa if you simply want a second residency in Asia but don’t have a specific country in mind.
FAQs
Thursday’s talks come a day after Commerce Minister Phumtham Wechayachai met with US trade officials, who vowed to encourage more American business investment in Thailand.
Phumtham told representatives of the US President’s Export Council (PEC) that his ministry was ready to cooperate with the US Department of Commerce and PEC in promoting economic, trade and investment relations between the two countries.
The PEC advises the US president on government policies and programs that affect US trade, promotes export expansion and provides a forum for resolving trade-related problems among stakeholders.
Phumtham also addressed the US Generalised System of Preferences [GSP] for imports, which expired at the end of 2020.
“The US promised to expedite GSP renewal for Thailand,” he said, adding that Bangkok was boosting protection of intellectual property (IP) rights to secure removal from the US IP Watch List.
He said both sides underlined the importance of supply chain development. Thailand is seeking to become a supply chain production base for advanced industries including digital, artificial intelligence, electronics, semiconductors, electric cars, clean energy, aviation, and pharmaceuticals.
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2. China’s shipping containers pile up at overcrowded port as overseas orders dwindle
(Ji Siqi – February 20, 2023)
Although the Lunar New Year holiday ended weeks ago, not all truck drivers in Shenzhen are back to work. On the expressway heading towards Yantian International Container Terminal, several trucks with no containers on their long trailers can be seen parked on the roadside, part of a static convoy that stretches nearly a kilometre (0.62 miles).
“These are only a small portion [of all the empty trucks]. The rest had to be parked in Dongguan,” said a driver surnamed Huang, referring to another city in Guangdong that is an hour drive away from Yantian – one of the biggest Chinese container ports for foreign trade.
Huang is one of the lucky drivers. He had just unloaded a container at the terminal on a Friday afternoon. He said the port has more than 15,000 registered truck drivers, but only around 2,000 of them now have work.
3. China’s bid to lure overseas tech talent home hits a snag: the sector’s toxic work culture
(Ji Siqi – February 19, 2023)
After being caught up in a mass lay-off at Amazon in January, Canada-based software engineer Mark Liu boarded a flight back to his hometown in central China.
The 30-year-old decided to take a rest at home and spend some time with his parents and grandparents, while preparing to look for a new job. But he will not be looking in China.
Liu is still seeking opportunities in Canada, even though the current wave of tech lay-offs there shows no sign of ending.
4. China’s durian demand is a godsend for Philippine trade, but for other Asian countries ‘durian diplomacy’ raises concerns
(Ji Siqi, Ralph Jennings, He Huifeng– February 15, 2023)
More than 900km southeast of Manila, Davao City is dubbed “Durian Capital of the Philippines”. With the volcanic soil of Mount Apo said to give the pungent “king of fruit” a unique flavour, the region accounts for almost 80 per cent of all durians grown in the country.
But now, even the local durian market in Davao is in short supply, as large amounts of the existing harvests have been reserved for China.
It all began with a new bilateral agreement signed between the two countries in early January, following the state visit of Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr to Beijing, which opened China’s door to fresh Philippine durians for the first time.
5. How are Chinese firms responding as foreign buyers ‘don’t want anything made in China’?
(He Huifeng, Luna Sun, Kandy Wong – May 25, 2023)
The writing is on the wall when it comes to the future of Norman Cheng’s operations in China, and like the protection offered by helmets his company produces, he sees a shift away from China as a matter of self-preservation.
To that end, he intends to open a smart factory in Vietnam next year – a US$30 million undertaking that embraces automation and will essentially be a replica of the plant he opened just last month in the southern Chinese manufacturing hub of Guangdong province.
The decision by one of the world’s largest helmet makers, Strategic Sports, was a long time in the making, and it was not borne out of capacity concerns. Cheng says they have plenty of that in China, where their first automation plant went into operation two years ago, capable of producing millions more helmets a year.
6. Thailand wants to build a brand new shipping route. Why isn’t China buying?
(Frank Chen, Kandy Wong – November 27, 2023)
When Beijing goes on the hunt for weak links in its economic chain, the Malacca Strait is a place Chinese officials and academics often cite as a point of exceptional vulnerability. Many essential materials – particularly crude oil and minerals, which carry vast strategic importance – are shipped through it.
The latest option to come across Beijing’s desk is the Land Bridge project in Thailand, which uses rail links to connect the Andaman Sea and the Gulf of Thailand and bypass Malacca entirely.
7. China to widen Asean trade with first major waterway in 700 years, but will Pinglu Canal be a game changer or white elephant?
(He Huifeng– July 24, 2023)
Chinese authorities like building roads and bridges from times gone by, as connectivity facilitates flows of people, goods and also fortune. But only a few can afford to construct canals that demand massive amounts of labour and mastery of technology.
Over 2,200 years ago during the Qin dynasty, China’s first emperor built the 36.4km (22.6 mile) Lingqu Canal to carry soldiers to conquer the southern tribes and expand the imperial territory.
Qin Shi Huang’s mega project connected Xiang River in Hunan province – a tributary of the 6,300km (3,915-mile) Yangtze River – and Li River in south China’s Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region.
8. Could China’s durian-farming ambitions end up testing Thai and Malaysian market dominance?
(Ralph Jennings, Mia Nulimaimaiti – May 22, 2023)
Malaysian durian expert Lim Chin Khee visits China every two months to help farmers grow the pungent tropical fruit.
Among the advice that the founder of the Durian Academy, near Kuala Lumpur, dispenses to growers of plantations larger than 404 hectares (1,000 acres) is to avoid wasting water and fertiliser.
Malaysia, meanwhile, exports high-end frozen durians from smaller farms to China, a rapidly expanding tropical fruit market for much of Southeast Asia.
9. Tech war: starved of chips, China’s bid to topple US as No 1 economy faces ‘unprecedented’ pressure
(Frank Tang, Ji Siqi – February 8, 2023)
Semiconductor chips are often compared to the beating heart driving technology innovation. But with the United States restricting exports of critical semiconductor components and technology to China, questions are mounting over how long the world’s second-largest economy can maintain a pulse.
Core technologies are China’s Achilles’ heel, despite having the world’s strongest industrial manufacturing capability, and they are easy prey for Washington in its strategy of tech containment.
Without mastery of the fiendishly complex chips that power everything from cars to smartphones, President Xi Jinping’s hopes of transforming China into the pre-eminent global digital power, while surpassing the US to become the No 1 economy in the world, could fall apart.
10. China’s home-grown C919 could break Airbus, Boeing duopoly with ‘brave step into foreign markets’
(Amanda Lee– January 18, 2023)
China’s home-grown narrowbody passenger jet could break the duopoly of Boeing and Airbus in its home market and beyond, despite its reliance on foreign parts, according to a report by a Berlin-based think tank.
The Mercator Institute for China Studies (Merics) argued that the size of China’s aviation market, strong industrial policy and a sector dominated by state-owned companies give the C919 an edge to advance the country’s “strategic objectives” in aviation.