aublumberg

You should consider getting a usufruct (สัญญาให้สิทธิเก็บกิน) which gives you permission to stay in the house, either for a specified duration, or for life. An alternative is a right of habitation, but usufruct has more extensive rights including ability to let out the house and receive the rent. Both can be done at the land office, and you will be listed on the chanote. Lots of info online if you google these terms or here in the forums. Recommend hiring a Thai lawyer to assist.

You're a tax resident already when "residing in Thailand for a period or periods aggregating more than 180 days in any tax (calendar) year". Whether you remit money or not doesn't matter. So the BOI statement is incorrect to begin with. Of course Revenue Department will have the final word, that's their job. Wouldn't expect a different statement by BOI on a public social media website.

Thanks Pib for your post. Good to see BOI changed from reporting applicants to reporting approved LTR visa holders. I am not too surprised about the ~50% rejection rate to be honest given many of the discussions and experience sharing on this forum and on others like Reddit especially for Work From Thailand Professionals (LTR-T) category. Perhaps this may have contributed to the recently proposed separate DTV visa category. 21 months into the program, the figures of approved LTR visas are very small, especially compared to the envisioned scale when the program was first promoted. Considering many of the Wealthy Pensioners converted from an existing O visa, and presumably many of the Wealthy Global Citizens and Work From Thailand Professionals may spend substantial periods of the year outside of the country (at least I do), then the total economic benefit may come down to just ~2,500 (pure estimate on my part) individuals including dependents living (and spending) in Thailand fulltime. Falling short just a tad of the 200k target per year on average. Let's hope BOI will continue the LTR program ...

Here you are https://image.mfa.go.th/mfa/0/rdX909e54m/อัลบั้มภาพ/New_Measures_as_of_29_May_2024_-_1955.pdf

Ah - yes, that makes sense, thanks.

Just as an FYI, I noted there are 3 new documents available recently under the Laws and Regulations link of the BOI LTR website: 7. Announcement of Ministry of Interior Affairs (TH) 8. Order of the Immigration Bureau No.150-2565 (TH) 13. Announcement of the Ministry of Labor (TH) No idea whether these are new laws or just to complete the list of legislation pertaining to LTR visa. I believe it's the latter. All are in Thai, the English versions are not (yet) available.

Am afraid you will need to get it translated, BOI only accepts Thai or English documents. Ich kann https://www.thailaendisch.de/ empfehlen, die sind zuverlässig und in der Nähe der Deutschen Botschaft in Bangkok. Alternativen gibts auch https://bangkok.diplo.de/th-de/service/uebersetzerliste/1393030

That's actually their new corporate head office (690 Sukhumvit Road), not just any branch. Agree the service there is good, and modern systems and processes.

No personal experience with LTR-WP but a couple observations with regards to the LTR Wealthy Pensioner requirements: earned income does not qualify at all, only passive income. As per BOI website "unearned or passive income includes, but are not limited to pension, rental, capital gain, dividend, and interest payments". So capital gain in general seems accepted, at least in their generic overview. Not sure whether that includes crypto. However, under the list of requirement documents BOI states "Individual income tax return such as P.N.D. 90/91, BIR60, Form 1040, SA100, T1 General etc. showing income of no less than 80,000 [...] USD per year in the past 2 years. In case of “Wealthy Pensioner category”, please provide a pension certificate or individual income tax return e.g. 1099r or any documents showing UNEARNED or PASSIVE income such as interests, dividends, royalties or rental incomes etc. of no less than 80,000 [...] USD per year". So (a) they seem to want at least 2 years history and (b) there's no more mention of capital gains in this section and the examples given for passive income have a recurring connotation. At the end of the day every case is different, and I would suggest you speak to BOI directly about your case and ask whether the documentary evidence that you can provide is sufficient for LTR-WP or not. They are usually quite responsive and helpful. Good luck!

You'd think so, yes. With a human in the middle theory and practice don't always match.

Yup exactly, happens even in Bangkok. Went through the Suvarnabhumi Fast Track channel (where you would expect the IOs to be very familiar with LTR since it's one of the few permissible visa types to use Fast Track) a week ago and at first the IO stamped me in visa exempt, then she asked whether I have a visa and I said LTR and pointed out the LTR visa stamp page, she then manually edited and signed the immigration stamp and revised permission to stay until date. Made a mental note to point out the LTR visa page proactively during future returns to Thailand.

Same here

Have you considered HSBC Expat? Found them good to work with. https://www.expat.hsbc.com/international-banking/products/bank-account Interest rates offered: https://expatexplorer.hsbc.com/interest-rates

For many the 800,000 would be in a fixed deposit account, so ATM card won't work in that case

Thanks for sharing the latest stats. I would have thought the tax exemption for remittances under LTR-T, LTR-WP and LTR-W would become a bigger draw, but perhaps that is yet to come. So it looks like we're on target ;-) "Thailand on Thursday (1 Sep 2022) started accepting applicants for its new Long Term Resident (LTR) visa scheme which hopes to attract 1 million wealthy or highly-skilled foreigners over the next 5 years and generate some 800 billion baht (S$30.5 billion) in new investments in the country."

Foreign currency brought into Thailand exceeding USD15,000 or equivalent has to be declared. Exchange Control Regulation (bot.or.th) ศูนย์บริการศุลกากร - Customs Care Center

It's not closed at all but if you don't meet the criteria (see photo above) for Fast Track then you are being directed to the other immigration queue. Agree the 'Priority lane' to the far right of the normal immigration queue could be better sign posted.

Thailand Privilege = Elite

I think the photo above is dated, here is what it looked like in April. As you can see they dropped First / Business class and changed ‘Long stay’ to LTR. Since a couple months they usually have an immigration officer there that by default tries to keep people out. Even with my LTR and separate APEC card at one time I was refused, probably IO ignorance. 9/10 it works just fine. No queues, and multiple booths. Mind you, over on the departure side it still has ‘Long stay’ as well as F and J class. 🤷

PromptPay has been integrated with equivalent mechanisms like FPS (Hong Kong) and Paynow (Singapore), there may be other countries as well, not sure. You can use your respective banking app from HK, SG and scan the QR code in Thailand to pay. I think this generally hits your debit card or savings account, not aware whether it works with foreign credit card. But certainly helpful to avoid carrying baht in cash. Joint Press Release Launch of PromptPay x FPS Link between Thailand and Hong Kong (bot.or.th) Microsoft Word - Media Release - PayNow - PromptPay v7.0 - clean (abs.org.sg)

Got mine from Immigration Department at Chamchuri Square, that's where BOI issues your LTR visa, used at DLT for same reason.

Many different Visa card options ... Bangkok Bank Credit Cards

ltr [at] boi.go.th

FYI ... it's an advertorial but some useful content and further clarity here Mazars in Thailand to Advise Thai Taxpayers on New Taxation Rules for Foreign Income (bangkokpost.com)