shiroboi

I have a much better time just exploring and being friendly with everybody. Seeking out only other Farang doesn't really give you a good feel for Thailand. Plus, touristy areas tend to take advantage of foreigners. Just my two cents.

Have you tried these troubleshooting tips?

http://appletoolbox.com/2014/10/ipad-air-2-wi-fi-problems-fix/

I have an ipad 2 and I bought a Galaxy note tablet as a testing device. The galaxy note is absolute garbage compared to my ipad. Flimsy build quality, horrible battery, mostly plastic. I'd have a hard time recommending anybody get a Galaxy tablet instead of an ipad.

Oooh, just saw this today. I really want a 3 but as a second car, it's out of my price range. This however, looks hot. May be worth holding out until this hits the market.

I think so, I've frequently seen ads in Chaengwattana for Nichada Thani. Since many ambassadors and staff stay there, there's a ton of stuff always opening up. I'm sure there's places available in every area. There's several different sub neighborhoods and buildings depending on what income level you're at.

I know this sounds really stupid, but my wife knows my taste in decorating and knows I like to have a full plan when I buy furniture. We'd have to dump a lot into furniture and AC units on a rental. Every time we go to rent something, we do the numbers and realized that we're probably better off just staying with the inlaws until we're serious enough to buy a house. I want to have my own place but there's too many benefits to staying with the in-laws right now. My littlest one isn't school age yet so it's pretty awesome being able to leave him home with the mother-in-law.

Thanks for all the advice. The general consensus is to wait another year to make sure the business is doing well. That's probably sound advice. I did incorporate a year prior so I have been in business for 2 years but just not in Thailand. The industry I'm in is experiencing explosive growth but i don't know how long it will last. My hope was to put down a very large down payment while the going was good.

Right now, we're staying with the in-laws. Sometimes I go crazy because of the lack of privacy but the built in baby sitting, cooking and laundry plus no rent is very, very hard to beat. I guess I'll just need to gather up my patience and wait it out some more.

I know people are all for renting here. My marriage is solid and I'm not worried about putting things in my wife's name. I'm 36 and I'd really like to work my ass off and buy a house in the next year or so that we can comfortably stay in indefinitely. I want my kids to have a good environment to grow up in. A condo or cheap rental doesn't fit that bill.

Yeah, it's definitely a wierd alternate reality. A farang bubble so to speak. I really like the neighborhood and the environment but If I wanted to be away from Thai people, I wouldn't have moved here from the US.

I opened a K-bank account in my name and had to pay for an ATM card. The Doraemon ATM card was the cheapest option. I have the Doremon ATM card.

Old post i know. I'm answering becuase nobody else has.

I'm not a resident but I attend a church in Nichada Thani so I've been through the neighborhood a few times.

Here's my thoughts. It's a very nice and quiet place. With all the Farang around, it doesn't feel like Thailand at all. Most people get around with golf carts. There's even golf-cart parking for Nichada residents at Central Chaing Wattana. International School of Bangkok is smack dab in the center of it so I think most residents send their kids there. There's tons of embassy employees that live there so it's a very transient community.

In short, it's a pleasant Farang bubble. For me, I like living in Thailand and interacting with Thai people so I wouldn't buy or rent there but for other people who can't adjust to Thai society well, I think it would be good. If you had kids and were staying for 2-3 years, it would be ideal, if you're a long term resident in Thailand, I don't see the point. Then again, I don't speak for everyone.

My wife and I have a business that we incorporated officially in Thailand in October of 2013. Recently, our business has really done well and we're looking to make a larger house purchase this October. We recently checked out an 11 MB house and the property company said that to qualify through them we had to show business statements for 2 years. We were under the impression that we had to show a year of statements. Is this normal for houses in this price range? We're planning on putting down a 25-30% deposit with an average monthly income 150-400K baht. I'd love to hear from some others who have bought more expensive homes. What was your experience?

Note: Everything would be in my Thai Wife's name. Ownership isn't a problem.

Update: Sorry its 1,340 km on the odometer, I misread that.

Here's pics of the bike. Before you ask, we have a photostudio so I rolled the bike in for the pic.

I had heard about BVO but the USA Mt.Dew didn't give me problems. Have no idea what is in there now that would give me the brain farts so bad.

MegaRanter, not sure what you're on about but, uh, you're welcome. Wife having a baby?

These are the ingredients. Too much sugar or caffeine? Mountain Dew ingrediants

Those are the US ingredients. Products are usually reformulated for the Thai market. There's no FDA over here. It doesn't taste the same so I'm gonna assume that's the case.

Doubt I'll get an answer but I'm bringing it up so maybe someone else can test it too.

My father-in law has started reselling used bikes. He has a really nice Yamaha TTX 125cc for sale. Color Black and Gray.

13K on the odometer. Looks like it had a few scratches on it but has been touched up nicely. Looks new, drives great. Been tempted to buy it myself but I don't need a bike.

Pics coming soon.

Location is in Pathumthani, just outside of Muang Pathumthani.

I just moved to Thailand this year. Since I was in high school (36 now) I was a big fan of Mt. Dew. Granted, it's the version from the states made with corn syrup, but i was also a fan of the "Throwback" version which contained real sugar.

I was seriously missing one of my favorite drinks. Imagine my delight when they brought Mt. Dew to Thailand a month or so ago. At least several times a week and for one particular week, I'd buy a Dew from 7-11 everyday.

Roughly around the same time, my wife started noticing issues with me. I was spacing out way more than usual, messing up basic tasks, couldn't concentrate. It got so bad, I took my 5 year old daughter to the bathroom, walked out and totally forgot about her. (Found her a few min later). It was like I had a fog in my brain and it wasn't working correctly.

I stopped drinking Mt. Dew and went back to my normal tea and coffee. Back to normal. Had another Mt. Dew the other day. Same brain fog.

What is in this stuff? I never had an issue drinking it before. I realize nobody else has probably had these issues but I'd love to hear opinions or if anyone can read Thai, the ingredients list.

I feel the same way about foreigners who move into Sukhumvit. I always wonder why they traveled all the way here just to huddle around other foreigners in a small area. Farang outnumber Thai 3 to 1 there.

Holy crap I had no idea that my 1 year IDP was only good for 3 months. I will try to get my Thai Drivers License post haste. Thanks everyone!

So I'm coming up on the end of my first year in Thailand. My International Driver Permit will expire at the end of the year. I'm wondering if I should just renew it by mail or if there's a benefit to getting a Thai drivers's license.

Any thoughts?

Thanks for the replies guys, I know hindsight is 20/20. He was born the day I arrived so we didn't have any insurance in place at the time. We'll look into getting insurance for him anyway.

I'm 36 and living in Thailand, married to a Thai national. We have two children. My youngest is having a kidney blockage and I'm forseeing lots of doctor visits in the future.

I'm starting a Thai based business in the next three months. I'm wondering if I should get the family insurance now or should I start the company first and get insurance through my company. I'd like to avoid a costly mistake down the road.

Any thoughts?

For starters, I'm a huge Mitsubishi fan, Owned a Galant, Eclipse and Lancer Ralliart. Almost bought a Pajero here too.

That being said, I think the new Attrage is butt ugly. The Mirage wasn't that bad but somehow, they took what little styling the Mirage had and flushed it down the toilet. They need to bring back the designer of the Lancer and make these things look more exciting.

I do think it's a good value though. I'm looking for a second car. If they give this thing a facelift in future versions, it might be worth a consideration.

It's been my experience that women, who often make the final decision on a home purchase, have little to no imagination when it comes to home shopping. They want to walk into a place and be hit by a wonderful feeling. It's all about emotions and it's really hard to get an emotional feeling about an empty room. Why do you think they put so much time and effort into decorating model homes to look so good? It sells the house.

Oh, that works if you have good taste in decorating. If your decoration sucks, maybe it's best to leave it empty. Clean and uncluttered is key.

I would absolutely hold off on buying a laptop now. It is a bad time to buy a laptop. The new Haswell chips are coming (both mac and PC) and it is having a major impact on battery life. The new macbook air with the Haswell chipset saw around a 50% boost in battery life. That should hold somewhat true for PCs as well. Either way, it's worth the wait.

I guess I figured as much. I just hate having to drain my phone in the car or charge it up to use as an extra device. Also, I don't want another 7" screen on my dash, I already have a big screen on my dash. I used it tonight to get home from Bangkok. I am having a hard time (or my wife is rather) locating specific addresses. Seems like there's lots of locations you just can't put in the device. I'm sure that goes for other garmin knockoffs as well.

So I bought a Honda Freed this weekend, and long story short, they told us it had Navigation. We got it and it didn't have navi. So they gave us an extra $5,500 baht off to get an aftermarket one.

First we went to the car parts market in Pathum Thani, hardly anything there. Then went to Future Park Rangsit, a huge mall with dedicated electronics section. I found a few Garmin Units in Power Buy and a few generics in the electronic section. Then we headed over to Zeer, a massive 6 story electronics mall. Only found a few booths selling generic devices. Finally I went into a shop to look at drawing tablets and found that they actually stocked quite a few GPS devices. I ended up settling on a basic Garmin unit.

But it really got me perplexed. Why in a car centric culture, is it so hard to find GPS units? Are they out of style now? All I see is cell phones and tablets everywhere. I usually consider myself pretty ahead of the curve as far as tech goes but are people still using GPS here? Never saw any other name brands other than Garmin. I'd love to hear some theories. I'm baffled.

I'm also thrown as to how you can buy cars with the premium package with DVD and video screens and not have GPS added. It's not even an option on a lot of cars. Dealer said we'd have to pay 30,000 extra for a Honda unit with built in Navigation. I passed.