Airalee

Your example was far from concrete - no substantiation of any of your figures. I can tell you that my rent has not increased in 6 years -- and that is a concrete fact.

Well let's get concrete......How much is your rent (that hasn't been raised in 6 years), How big is it , is it a house or condo, where?

I can show you numerous examples in Chiang Mai on Chiang Mai Properties website, where the property is *currently rented* and also listed for sale, where the numbers just don't pencil out in favor of buying. I cannot find any where it does favor buying.

฿4,500,000 condos renting (and currently rented) for ฿20,000 are plentiful.

If someone was buying them using a mortgage with 0% down (20% is required for that level by most banks but I want to compare apples with apples as a renter doesn't need such a large down payment) the mortgage payment plus monthly fees would be more than 30,000 baht. It doesn't take a genius to see that if one were to buy it with a mortgage, in order to rent it out, that person would be, in essence, subsidizing their tenants living costs.

The current crop of homedebtors...erm...homeowners can bleat about how much they have made in appreciation but I only concern myself with the numbers as they sit today...and at this time, those numbers greatly favor renting.

Mortgage rates and terms taken from kasikorn banks website

http://www.kasikornbank.com/EN/Personal/Loans/KHomeLoan/Pages/KHomeLoanKasikorn.aspx

Kasikorn MRR rate is currently 7.87%

http://www.efinancethai.com/otherfin/loan.aspx

Of course, if purchased for cash, then opportunity cost would be calculated but that would rely on unknown variables by both the Bulls and the Bears.

I would like to ask however, that the houseowners/debtors refrain from their tired, petty jabs at the renters with regards to their financial status, and also give up their emotional arguments "it's a home if you buy it and a house/hovel if you rent it" because it really just makes you look desperate.

Then there is the furniture aspect. Your going to end up on some crappy hard as concrete bed and usually cheap Thai made furniture. Again your at the control of your land lords tastes and NOT yours..who wants to go through life like that? Sure you can buy your stuff but that drops rental availability by 70% since most condos are furnished..and then you have to relocate when your landlord ups the rent by 50%

In the last condo I rented, the landlord was happy to move the "hard as concrete" bed out so that I could bring my own in. The rest of the furniture was good enough (ikea/index). She never raised my rent once. After 2 years, I moved out and was refunded 100% of my deposit. The unit sat empty for almost a year before being rented again...for the same price. My current landlord has just discounted my rent by 7% in order to keep me as a tenant,

Supply, meet demand.

After a number of years, most of the condos in CM look like slums or just become abandoned buildings and the construction quality is atrocious.

Will your condo ultimately end up looking like this?

Blue diamond smokehouse almonds (the ones sold in Tops are nothing like the ones I buy at home in the US and 1/2 the price)

Kraft Parmesan/Romano cheese ($3.79/8 oz. vs ฿415/4 oz.)

Wishbone chipotle-ranch salad dressing

Most of the world's population can't afford a $1500 mattress, what pointless lives they must be living.

is he a third worlder? No. He's a westerner that failed and is trying to convince everyone that hes happy living worse than a burmese with no safety net.

Different set of priorities is all,doesn't make him a failure. As long as he's doing it as a choice and spending his own money he's won half the battle right there,. If he decides he wants more stuff there's plenty of options for him to change his lifestyle.

when every post he does is attacking people about spending money and bragging about spending nothing, you know hes very unhappy and hes not choosing this lifestyle. Just like a happy vegan doesnt piss everyone off about being a vegan.

You kinda sound like the angry flipside

Not only does the location not sound good, but the food sounds like a random mishmash of dishes. If you say that there are no good Chinese restaurants in town, then why not just specialize in Chinese food? There seem to be enough Chinese tourists in town to support a Chinese restaurant. But to be completely honest, I wouldn't buy sandwiches from a Chinese restaurant nor would I buy Chinese food from a deli.

I have eaten there a few times and have no real complaints. Their guacamole is excellent. I only wish we could find the so-cal style taqueria tacos here in chiang Mai. The kind that comes on a pair of corn tortillas (not those yellow kinds that you might find in the grocery stores back in the states...mission brand I think) and only have meat (carne asada, pastor, carnitas) onions cilantro and salsa (the liquidy red or green kind) and is served with lime wedges on the side.

There really shouldn't be any argument with regards to what authentic Mexican tacos are as if you google "Mexican tacos", you will see that 90% of the google images are of what I have described.

*Plummeted* 50 baht.

Haha

Just happened to randomly check the Pattaya forum and happened upon this thread. For what it's worth, I live in Chiang Mai.

I had a case of frozen shoulder back in 2011 that went away on its own accord over the course of a few months with gentle manipulation by a massage therapist.

Two years later, I had it in my other shoulder and nothing seemed to work. The same gentle stretching etc had no positive effect over a period of almost 6 months. I was finally referred to Dr. Chanakarn at Rajavej Hospital in Chiang Mai. First we tried a cortisone injection that didn't help at all. (400 baht). He then sent me for an MRI (8000 baht) and it showed that I had a couple bone spurs in my shoulder that over time had rubbed on the ligament and there was lots of scar tissue. I'm pretty sure it was due to a hard fall I took while snow skiing 25 years ago while in University. Who knows.

Anyhow... I opted for arthroscopic surgery where he shaved down the spurs and cleared out the scar tissue. I followed that with about 20 physical therapy sessions and over time, the mobility returned to about 95%.

The cost of the surgery and one night in the hospital was just over 90,000 baht. Physical therapy at Rajavej was 300 baht per session (not included in the 90,000) totaling 6000 baht.

The total cost all in was around 105-110,000 baht. The doctor was very competent and comes highly recommended by other expats here in Chiang Mai and also by one of the owners of SEE TEFL whom I knew personally had his knees worked on. Dr Chanakarn is also the Ortho/Sports Medicine Dr. for the Thai National (Olympic) team so I felt I was in good hands.

I hope things work out for you with whichever path you choose. Hopefully surgery won't be required, but I wanted to share my experience. I know how painful it can be. Best of luck to you

FWIW, I was 45 when I had the surgery and am 47 now.

Not including the issues pointed out by Chiang Mai and bangmai above, this is what I see.

Kitchen... No ventilation hood above cooktop. A window in front of the cooktop does not suffice. Is there an oven? No room for a full size refrigerator. Large gap between refrigerator location and counter to the left. Why doesn't the counter extend to the end of the window? European kitchen? Not like any I have ever seen, but I have never been to Albania.

Bathroom... Pink tiles with rose motif tiles set in. No thanks.

General style... 4 different kinds of unattractive tiles throughout the house. No continuity.

Outside... Garish driveway tiles, no landscaping other than grass. No curb appeal.