Awk

The other day, I had just finished a heavy 8 workout when a 160lb pencil neck emerged from the woodwork. He says, your grunting noises sound like those of a dying man!" I replied "You just had to come over here and make that stupid statement - now get lost!" He looked like Bambi caught in the headlights. Speechless, he made his exit.

Reminds me of the other day at the gym here. Some foreigner was deadlifting what could barely have been a 100kg, and not weighing much less himself. Pulling it up, and then dropping it from the full thigh height with a bang you could hear on the other side of the gym. He did that for all his 8 or so reps. Then the same on the next set.

Dunno what he was thinking he was doing. A competition-weight snatch? A clean & jerk?

Idiot was grunting loudly on every rep too. For a moment I thought somebody had forgot to mute the discovery channel on the tv.

8000 Baht? Seriously?? Real estate agents are typically interested in finding you a home, not a shoe box. Perhaps if you were in the market for a condo (or house) that cost around 20K Baht per month, then maybe they would entertain you.

Btw: 8000 Baht = US$250

I dont understand your attacks... We rented perfectly big townhouse, for 6000 THB...much more bigger then any condo. and with garden for our dog.

Ignore him. He is clueless. 5-10,000/month is a normal price to rent a mid-level house outside of the gated moo baans here in CM.

That said, at this price range I think it is normal to do your own minor maintenance. If a pipe is leaking, we call the plumber ourself. AC leaking? Same thing. We are paying 7,000B a month and are not interested in squeezing the landlord to pay for all sorts of minor things that will break.

A few years ago a more serious leak developed under the second floor bathroom, with water dripping down on the first floor. We called a plumber, and he said we would have to dig up the second floor bathroom floor to fix it, or he could just do a half-assed fix that would prevent us from seeing the problem, but which would eventually rotten the structures under the bathroom floor, which no doubt would be much costlier to fix later. We called the owner about this, telling her it was probably better to fix it properly now, and we could deduct a months rent or the equivalent, depending on what the total cost would be. The owner told us to sit tight and she sent some other plumber, who I think told the owner the same thing. It ended up with us paying 500-700B or so for the half-assed fix to her plumber. No problem, we can pay 700, but we are not paying 7,000 for something we did not break.

If we were paying 20,000B+ a month, I'd probably expect the owner to come and fix the small 500B problems himself however, or let us deduct them from the rent.

Ok ^^

I have finished 1 month muay thai camp ^^

And now I would like gain mass.

You think Power house fitness is good ?

it is near to where I live ^^

Help me for choose Thanks ^^

Unless you have been training long enough to not ask a question like that, which is not long at all, any half-decent gym is good enough, Powerhouse included. Choose the one closest.

What you want is a network engineer, or more realistically, somebody with some competence in networking, and possibly Internet-tv. Don't watch TV over the Internet myself, but would suggest you repost in the thaivisa Internet-forum with some more details (e.g., what Internet tv? Streaming from where? 20Mb from who?). You are likely to get more helpful answers there, as this is probably not a Chiang Mai specific problem.

Rules are rules, but there are people here also, apparently JIB not included, who understand that providing decent service should not be too much to expect.

After nearly 40 years I finally closed my retail operation because I got tired of people who thought that "decent" service should encompass that I should lose money because of the poor choices of others. Really!?! Sixty days after purchase and you expect every retailer to accept a return?

And addressing the original question, a seller as no legal obligation to accept a return, it is indeed a courtesy service extended by the seller to the buyer. A service much easier to provide in some high margin sectors such as womens clothing (ladies, you are paying through the nose on everything for all those returns) or some household items.

Actually, there is a quote in this thread saying the seller is required to accept returns under certain terms:

"5. Refunds: Merchants are required to give a full refund to consumers within 15 days after receiving the termination notification. However, in case the merchandise has been damaged by the consumer, the consumer must be responsible for such damage. A description of the goods and services to be excluded from this seven-day delay will be provided by future regulations, as will be the general procedures for returning goods."

This contradicts what you say. Is the quote wrong, or is it you who do not know what you are talking about when you say there is no obligation for the seller to accept a return?

Something tells me that, unlike the shop that had no problems with me exchanging the product I had previously bought, your shop would not see any repeat business from me. Nor would I be recommending your shop to anyone. Rather, I suspect I would tell people to stay far away.

Oh, and for what it is worth. I did not expect the shop to allow me to exchange the dress after two months. I brought it back with me because I planned going to a tailor and have it adjusted slightly. This adjustment would be much cheaper to do here in CM than in the expensive country I was working in. But I also thought it wouldn't hurt to stop by the shop I had bought the dress in, just on the off chance they would not laugh me out the door. Fortunately, I did not meet the Basil Fawlty of clothing shops, though he does appear to be alive and posting here.

Rules are rules, but there are people here also, apparently JIB not included, who understand that providing decent service should not be too much to expect.

After nearly 40 years I finally closed my retail operation because I got tired of people who thought that "decent" service should encompass that I should lose money because of the poor choices of others. Really!?! Sixty days after purchase and you expect every retailer to accept a return?

And addressing the original question, a seller as no legal obligation to accept a return, it is indeed a courtesy service extended by the seller to the buyer. A service much easier to provide in some high margin sectors such as womens clothing (ladies, you are paying through the nose on everything for all those returns) or some household items.

Actually, there is a quote in this thread saying the seller is required to accept returns under certain terms:

"5. Refunds: Merchants are required to give a full refund to consumers within 15 days after receiving the termination notification. However, in case the merchandise has been damaged by the consumer, the consumer must be responsible for such damage. A description of the goods and services to be excluded from this seven-day delay will be provided by future regulations, as will be the general procedures for returning goods."

This contradicts what you say. Is the quote wrong, or is it you who do not know what you are talking about when you say there is no obligation for the seller to accept a return?

Something tells me that, unlike the shop that had no problems with me exchanging the product I had previously bought, your shop would not see any repeat business from me. Nor would I be recommending your shop to anyone. Rather, I suspect I would tell people to stay far away.

I bought something a JIB, a USB stick, and then realized I had made a mistake and bought the wrong one. I tried returning it, before I had ever left the store, and it was a major hassle, and they didn't want to do it, but seemed to do so extremely reluctantly, only because it was brand new, I hadn't left the store yet, and had a receipt.

Crossing JIB of the list then. Not even leaving the shop, eh. That's just too funny.

Bought a two piece woman dress at one of the shops at the bottom of Airport Plaza once, before going abroad on a two-month job. The clothes were a gift for a friend in the country I was going to work in. Size ended up being slightly wrong unfortunately. Brought the dress with me back to the AP shop when the job had finished and did not have any problems exchanging it for another dress of the correct size.

Bought some other clothes at the same shop a few months later.

Rules are rules, but there are people here also, apparently JIB not included, who understand that providing decent service should not be too much to expect.

was arrested and held for some time and grilled in a very accusatorial manner by the Americans

An appropriate response would have been to tell them to ---- off and mind their own business.

Right of course Chicog but as you can imagine he was rather stunned and scared.

Well, that's what happens in real life. On the Internet, anyone can tell anyone to <removed> off, of course.

There seem to be some conflicting opinions here.

At least some of those who are saying it is necessary to purchase insurance seem be speaking from experience, while I am not sure if those who say it is not necessary are also speaking from experience.

So may I please ask: has anybody here actually got a loan for land or house from a regular bank without also paying for the insurance?

Hi, we are, hopefully in the not to distant future, applying for a bank loan in order to buy some land to build a house on. Or rather, Mrs. Awk is, with me, working off-shore, serving as guarantee. From what I've read here and there, the banks will all try to push a rather expensive life insurance on us (or rather, Mrs. Awk) at very end of the process. Is this insurance mandatory, or just something they are selling hard?

Presumably the bank will not be lending us the whole amount needed to buy the land, but e.g. 80%, with us paying the remaining 20% from our own money. If we default on the loan, presumably they can sell the repossessed land and get back at least what they lent us, if not more. so I don't understand why the bank should require us to buy an expensive life insurance also. Before coming to Thailand, I had never heard about this concept, and it is not something used in my own country.

We had a similar problem when buying a new car a year ago, where the brand dealer was advertising a loan of about 80% of the sales price with zero interest. The finance institution (or some small bank I had never heard of? not sure) the car brand had contracted with sent some woman to the car dealer to talk with us, and this woman, at the end of taking down both Mrs. Awk's and mine details, said we would also need to purchase a life insurance for Mrs. Awk from here. Never having heard about anything like this at that time, I could not help but laugh slightly at her idea, and told her thanks, but no thanks, no, no way.

There were some tense moments, and the bank woman said it would be very difficult for us to get a loan without the insurance. I honestly thought the idea was ridiculous so just departed to another corner to examine the colour finish of one of the show room models, allowing Mrs. Awk to continue the conversation by herself. Mrs. Awk did not appreciate it very much, but in the end we then signed the loan application.

Never heard anything more about any life insurance, but a few days later the car company called to tell us the loan application had been approved.

So my obvious question is, is the life insurance the banks are pushing the same nonsense, or will they really deny us a loan if we do not purchase the insurance?

If purchasing life insurance is unavoidable, how does one get away with paying the least amount? I've read some posts indicating that Bangkok Bank will require the whole insurance, for the entire duration of the loan, to be paid up front. I think I've read some other posts indicating SCB will allow you to pay one year at a time, and if you only pay for the first year and ignore the bill for the subsequent years, apparently nothing bad happens.

When applying for the loan I want to apply for a long-term loan (20 years, or close to that), but if things go as hoped, I I want to pay of the loan much quicker. If a life insurance is forced upon us, I obviously do not want to end up paying for 20 years of life insurance if the loan will end up being paid of in 3. At the same time, I don't have much hope of the bank refunding any up-front paid life insurance payment for the remaining 17 years.

I've also read that some banks, and I am interested in which, will charge a lower interest for the first few years, and then raise it. This, coupled with "no fee" for paying of the loan early, which I will obviously have to verify is the case, would obviously be beneficial to somebody who hopes to pay of the loan quickly.

For the record, the loan will probably only be for buying land, while money for building the house I will get from another source. Kasikorn turned Mrs. Awk down as they did not want to lend us money to buy just land. They indicated things may change if she could also submit some (approved?) plan for the house to be built. Bangkok were about to accept the application, when the seller suddenly changed his mind (him having already received our deposit not withstanding).

Since then I've been told by others that Bangkok Bank is probably the worst bank to deal with and are unlikely to let us borrow much (perhaps only 50% of the price), and SCB would be much better. I personally have no idea, but thinking that next time I will perhaps try SCB instead? Or both? Would need to pay the land appraisal fee of 2,500 (at least, that is what it is in BB) twice then though. :-/

Thanks for any tips.

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I assume you can check the power usage yourself by buying one of those plugs that have a display showing how much power is currently being drained and asking to connect through it at the Toshiba shop if you explain why. Doesn't cost a fortune and is probably available at Home Pro or Amorn. I stay away from Big C as much as I can due to the utter junk they sell. Perhaps the Toshiba shop will even have one available for you to use for testing, so you do not need to buy one.

.

You can check the power rating on the technical specs panel look under Watts.

Yes, but that is normally only one rating, for one speed, and it is not always clear for what speed either (average? max? min?). If you want to compare the power drawn by e.g. the bigger unit at a medium setting to two smaller units running at the high setting, or two smaller units at the medium setting to one bigger unit at the high setting, it will be difficult to do without something that measures the power drawn.

I want to use an air purifier in the master bedroom that is around 43 square meters. I found I can get Toshiba air purifiers for 43 square meters for between 12,000 and 14,000 baht. Or for what looks like a comparable Toshiba air purifier I can get one for 5,000 baht that cover 33 square meters.

What I am wondering is would it make more sense to buy two of the 5,000 baht air purifiers instead? It would actually be a little less and if I move to another house I might not need an air purifier for a 43 square foot room. Would the electricity cost be a lot higher with the two air purifiers or would I probably run them at lower speeds so the difference wouldn't be that much? Only other item might be the cost of replacement filters for two air conditioners vs one.

I'd appreciate hearing from anyone with knowledge in this area before I decide which way to go.

Sensible questions.

I'm no expert, but I would doubt that the only difference between the 12,000B unit and the 5,000B unit is that the more expensive unit has an, I assume, CADR-rating of only 30% more than the cheaper unit, yet costs 140% more. It would also indicate that by buying two units for the combined sum of 10,000B, you will get a lot (50%) more bang for the buck than you will by buying one unit for 12,000B.

I checked the price on two models from the Blueair company, two models I think are mostly identical except the CADR-rating. From Blueair the more expensive unit has a CADR-rating that is 52% higher, and costs 66% more. Those numbers make more sense to me, so I would double check that there are not some other significant differences between the two Toshiba units. Hopefully some difference you don't need to care about.

Many posts cleaned out - 2 members trading flames. And the popcorn gallery throwing in comments.

I thought it was peanut gallery...... did the corrupt pollys steal the name and change it ????

Being the author of one of the aforementioned "cleaned out" posts, I can assure you that it was indeed peanuts I was throwing from back here. I have in the past tried to throw popcorn, but found that it is difficult to hit what I am aiming at with popcorn. Something about their mass perhaps?

Anyone know of a rai or two of land for sale, within 20 km or so from the city, with a view of a mountain you can see well from the ground without squinting your eyes, or perhaps near a river? Perhaps even not too many kilometres from the highway? Within 1M per rai and with no access right problems? PM welcome.

Nahm Prea..

If you follow the sign where it says villa farang or village farang.. A turning past the obkham nat park one.. past the couple of bungalows.. Theres an open space with IIRC a white fence.. This 30 rai plot was going at 650 a rai and has been bought, subdivided and I am told with be walled, electric supply and internal roads and is asking about 1 maybe 1.1 a rai.. It has a nice view and aspect, real (not dirt) roads around it, and fits what you have said.. I have done no due diligence as I have a few rai in nahm preah but theres plenty around that village going for less than a mil thai to thai.. Theres also a lot of locked up red backed chanotes coming free in the next year or two so both opportunity and beware.

We were around that area, as I remember the amusing name, "Villa/Village Farang", some months back, but did not notice the plot you talk about. Quite a bit further out from the city than what we looked at last and thought we were buying, but might go have a look again, so thank you.

I of course don't mind opportunity, and we could probably have gotten the land we were looking at quite a bit cheaper too, as it was clear at the first meeting there were some economical difficulties and that they were a bit desperate to sell. Desperate enough to trigger some alarm clocks for me. Didn't want to take advantage too much though, so accepted the terms the owner initially asked for without haggling; they seemed pretty decent to me, though some here seem to disagree. Much good it did us though. :-/

In retrospect, I think we have gone about things the wrong way; driving around, looking for "for sale" signs, or looking on the Internet (bahtsold for me, and various Thai-language websites for Mrs. Awk). I now understand that many places, perhaps plots of land especially, will not have such a sign on them, and that driving around looking for them will to a large extent be a waste of time. Prices on the Internet seem to be quite a bit higher, and of course, far from everything is advertised there.

In the future, we will instead try to find the puu yai ban, or closest to that, and ask him or neighbours whether anyone nearby is selling. Hopefully it will not take another four months to find something acceptable again, but who knows. :-/

Thanks again.

Latency for 583? Its normal for the net to slow when work/school is finished for a few hours, but it seems there is more to it.

Are you using wifi to connect? you might be getting the slow times because of a nearby router using the same channel.

Yes usually the latency is 800-1000 and this is local Thailand server traffic, not international. As I said, 583 was a "good result" for when it has the problem.

I've also tried:

a) changed the service from ADSL (800 month) to their 1200/month service.

b ) got a new computer, tested from 2 different computers with all the other devices shut down.

c) replaced the router

d) plugged Ethernet cable directly into the router and disabled wireless.

problem still occurs.

You might want to lookup how to use the traceroute program, called tracert on windows I think. It might provide a good indication of where in the network path the latency increase occurs. Do some traceroutes while the latency is low/good, and then the same when it is bad, and compare.

Well. this seems to be a big job every Thai is waiting for. Why not check the internet how to handle allu in respect to paint/paint spraying and DIY.

If I were to DIY I would have to buy a new compressor and spraygun, which would be about the same cost, or more, as getting these pieces painted by a shop.

I'm going in again today to see if I can persuade some auto paint shop to do it.

If not, maybe you can try one of the shops who do motorbikes? Perhaps they will be more interested since they are used to small jobs (just the gas tank, just the side fairing, etc.).

Not sure what you mean by off the grid. The quote we have gotten from the electric company is around 60,000B, and that is for doing the job in "off duty" hours. The distance is certainly less than 1km, 3-400 metres at most. I would be surprised if, in this case I guess it would be our agent, is trying to rip off us. Does the price sound equally crazy to others?

YES!

And what's all this agent-business anyway. The fewer agents, lawyers and other townsfolk involved between you (well, your wife) and the seller, the better it is!

While I agree, unfortunately we have not been able to find anything good by ourself. If money was no subject, of course there are plenty of nice places, but in the price range we are looking at, 4-5M for land with a decent garden and a decent house included, we haven't found much. Not that I doubt others who know better how to look will be more able to find this, but things are how they are and after four months of looking, this land, and another land/house combination was the only one both Mrs. Awk and I liked.

Anyway, this particular story has now ended in an unfortunate way. Having said A, I should also say B. So to update the few members that may be curious as to how the story will end, the day after we handed over our deposit, the story ended.

I have left some lines above blank for the expected "idiot, why did you pay a deposit"-tirades, which I will not blame anyone for thinking.

Fortunately or unfortunately, what one might expect to have happened, given I have already said things ended in an unfortunate way after we paid the deposit, the perhaps most expected turn of events is not what took place.

On Tuesday Mrs. Awk was hinting that maybe we should pay substantial deposit on the land, perhaps around 500,000. I thought that was a silly idea, and reminded her that the one living neighbour the land has (the other three sides of the land are owned by farmers, using the land for farming) told us that he was offered the same land we are looking at 7 years ago. At that time, for 750,000B per rai, rather than the 1M per rai we are looking at. Mrs. Awk thought they were probably not trying to sell the land actively in all these years, but, uh, yeah, whatever, was my feeling about that.

On Wednesday Mrs. Awk informed me that the land owners niece, who seems to get a long more than just a little with Mrs. Awk, in earnest or not I do not know, had called her. This niece has been assisting her uncle in selling the land, including acquiring the necessary official permissions to access his land. This niece also has her own land to sell, neighbouring the land we are looking at, but has previously indicated she does not want to sell now, as she thinks she will get much more money if she waits. So things have developed such that while we had only meet her uncle, the actual owner, once, we have met the niece a handful of times, and Mrs Awk seems to also have spent some time talking with her on the phone.

Perhaps they have also met without me sometimes. Mrs. Awk likes to talk, a service I do not provide to an adequate degree, and seems to get fairly well along with other people and is happy to talk with anyone she thinks is a nice person.

So on Wednesday afternoon the niece as said called Mrs. Awk to inform her another couple (probably the same Thai-Thai couple I observed in the distance one afternoon when we were there looking at the land) was planing to make a deposit on the land. She explained to Mrs. Awk how much she liked us, and how she did not like the other couple much, and neither did her uncle and some other neighbour who had also met them. Yes, that is not only a little bit hard to believe for me, but Mrs. Awk thought it was true, and I agreed with her I am very handsome and many women like me. And the niece is after all a woman. Also, the littlest Awk is quite a charmer and opens many doors. At that point I thought the story was not just a little doubtful, but still, perhaps not entirely impossible. The niece had said she would really like us to buy that land, and then we would be neighbours with her land (which she plans to sell at some later point, so whatever that means) but if the other couple submitted their deposit, then her uncle would sell to them, and then that would be that. At this point, the sums being mentioned were, again, around 500,000, so now I understood where Mrs. Awk had got that idea from.

To better understand the story, it should also be mentioned that as Mrs. Awk has been told things, the land owners daughter has mortgaged some other land, which Mrs. Awk eventually was told is due for payment this month. As a bonus, it has apparently been mortgaged not to a bank, but some other "financial institution". I do not know if that is an institution of dubious character with it's representatives driving around in twos on one CBR 150, or not. Details have not been very forthcoming, except it has given Mrs. Awk the impression the reason they want to sell the land at this price is due to some financial problems. Of course, that price is still 30% above what they apparently asked for the land 7 years ago, and some indicate it might be more than a little overpriced still.

Anyway, I told Mrs. Awk I had no interest in paying a deposit on the land, least of all a hefty deposit like that. We still had things to check out, including, but not limited, finalising the rights to access the land, which required permission from all related land owners, of which there were three or four. I did not want to rush this, as it's a lot of money for us; if somebody else laid down a deposit on the land, that would be sad, but not as sad as loosing a lot of money. After that I suggested that we do not waste any more time on this and checking things, but instead wait a few days to see what happens. If the story was true, then more than likely somebody else would buy that land. Admittedly, I felt more sad about this than I indicated to Mrs. Awk, but it just did not seem like an intelligent idea at that time to put down a hefty deposit.

The next day, Thursday morning, as Mrs. Awk was dropping of little Awk to school, the niece again called Mrs. Awk and suggested Mrs. Awk accompany her to the land office, as she was going there to check out some more things related to the access to land rights. Mrs. Awk was nearby, and so for some reason, said sure. Mrs. Awk also likes the niece, I guess. At the land office Mrs. Awk and the niece in the end discovered that the dirt track used to access the land we were looking at was now a public road, or at least, on public land. It had by two original land owners, back before that they split the land up into several smaller parcels to give their relatives, some 20 years ago or more, been donated to the government (or the equivalent. It was now a public road according to the land office).

What more Mrs. Awk and the niece talked about I am not sure, but apparently it was again mentioned how much happier everybody would be if we bought that land and not that other couple. Could we pay at least 100,000B as a deposit, so they could clear some of the problems the owners daughter had with the mortgage? Mrs. Awk indicated that was too much for us, but perhaps we could pay 50,000, if that was enough for them to stall the problems related to the mortgage for a month or so, while we finalised things? Apparently, this 50,000 was enough.

I was still more than a little sceptical, but Mrs. Awk had a fair amount of faith in this niece and what she was telling. And after all, the access rights had turned out to be a non-issue now. While I was not happy to lose 50,000 on some scam, we had as said been looking for land or house for four months now before ever getting this close to something we both liked. So I thought it might be a gamble worth doing. That same afternoon we paid the 50,000B deposit in the present of the owner and his wife, his daughter and son in law, his niece, our agent, and two buffalos (four-legged) that forced me to move our car out of the way before signing the deposit contract. It gave us two months to check out everything and pay the remaining 97.5% of the sum.

Mrs. Awk waied the owner, I shook his hand, his daughter apparently immediately pocketed the money, and all seemed to be satisfied.

The afternoon next day, Friday, things were not so merry any longer. The other couple, upon being told somebody else had now made a deposit on the land, apparently became furious and drove up to owner, yelling and screaming. Who says Thais never raise their voice? There was some talk back and forth between the interested parties on the phone with Mrs. Awk, but it ended with the owner saying he will accept (accepted already?) a 500,000B deposit from the other couple, saying he would refund us our 50,000B deposit (forced upon on our agent later that same evening), and his daughter informing us they no longer have any intention to honour the agreement. His niece apparently also gave her uncle, the owner, more than a hide full and is full of apologies towards Mrs. Awk, but that did not change anything.

So, that was the sad end to this story, and we will have to start looking again after having taken a break for some weeks upon being shown this land. :-( Quite tiring and depressing it is, as I suspect it will take a long time before we see something similar.

Anyone know of a rai or two of land for sale, within 20 km or so from the city, with a view of a mountain you can see well from the ground without squinting your eyes, or perhaps near a river? Perhaps even not too many kilometres from the highway? Within 1M per rai and with no access right problems? PM welcome.

I find it rather annoing that Bangkok Bank insists we will not get the appraisal paper, but instead say some nonsense about it being a company secret. That means we will have to pay for the same appraisal at other banks no doubt, if we want to see if we can get a better deal there. The BB guy also told Mrs. Awk all banks provide the same terms, and the only difference regards when/how much we pay at the start of the loan period. Also sounds like nonsense to me.

BK Bank is incredibly hard to get home loans from.

SCB would be a much better bet for you, as the bank says, they all have the same terms, so why start with one known to be difficult.

Went all the way through with BKB just over a year ago, started offering 95%, ended offering 50%, no explanation given.

Jumped to SCB and they gave me 90%, no problems.

PS

Note they all want a life insurance taken out in the name of the loan applicant for the full value of the loan.

All premiums paid up front, so about 5-6% of the loan extra. They won't tell you about this until the last minute, unless you ask. (on a 2M loan, expect to pay 120k for a life insurance up front)

Thanks for that. Now that you mention it, I remember reading about that life insurance annoyance before, perhaps mentioned by you, though I had completely forgotten it. I must be sure to mention to Mrs. Awk that should she suffer a fatal accident, her children and I will get the land for free, while the money otherwise used to pay of the bank can hopefully be spent on go-go girls (in Bangkok of course. As we all know, there are few if any interesting go-go girls here in CM) and other more amusing things.

Interestingly enough the same thing came up when we were buying a new car a year ago. The woman from the bank the car brand had contracted with insisted we needed to pay around 5,000B for life insurance. I, to Mrs Awk's initial annoyance, told her thanks, but no thanks, no way, what a crazy idea. I could also not help chuckle a little when she first mentioned this silly idea. The bank woman in the end indicated it might make it difficult for us to get a loan then.

In this particular case, the consequence was only that we saved 5,000B, as the loan was granted anyway without anything else said. (A nice four year loan at zero interest and no extra fees as far as I have able do decipher.) I gather this is very much not the case in case of dealing with a loan for land or house then? Quite a hefty sum too.

By premiums paid up up front, I assume you mean if you are asking for a 10 year loan, you will have to pay the life insurance premiums for 10 years up front? Sounds very nasty, but good to have an early warning about that, Otherwise I would think they are scamming me and become pissed of enough to just say goodbye. Think I will peruse the financial forum here for any tips too. Thanks.

As for the reason we first went to BB, that was mostly a coincidence I guess. Mrs Awk first went to Kasikorn, where she does her own banking, but they weren't interested in lending her money just for land. If she could also show a plan for the house, things would be different they said, so Mrs. Awk suggested we get one made as cheap as possible, just for show. Seemed like a waste of money to me though, as we would then have to make another, real, plan, and I want to use the needed time for that. Since she after Kasikorn went to BB, which also said it would be better with a plan, but we could still borrow money just for the land, that's what we ended up with so far.

At that time, I was also not aware we have to pay anything to get an answer to our application, so I just suggested Mrs. Awk go to all the banks and we could later compare terms. Perhaps the terms do not differ much then, as the BB guy said, but it sounds from you that the amount we will be allowed to barrow may differ quite a bit. Ideally, I'd like to borrow 100%, or more, as we will need to spend a similar sum for the building the house itself.

BB says after I hand in that last paper they will use about a week for the appraisal, and then another two weeks for an answer. Quite a long time, so we will trot down to a SCB branch also as you suggest, where we no doubt also will have to pay 2,500B for the same appraisal we on monday will will pay BB 2,500 for.

Thanks.

Yes i agree kids better of in houses then in condos..especially cause then they can play with other children but you intend to buy a remote plot in middle of no where..So not much playmates if any for your kids..

How about renting/buying a house in a gated community? hassle free 24/7 security gym shops restaurants and pools, its all there ! it makes more sense to me then what you are trying to do here..Your children and you wife will appreciate the safer village life much more....Land and houses makes nices villages 2-3 million BHt..

I'm sure that once the CM resident nobility discovers that the Awks have settled down there, there will be no shortage of prominent neighbours building.

Safety is a concern yes. We looked at another place 3-4 months ago. This one:

http://www.bahtsold.com/view/secuded-hideaway-but-still-close-to-town-175667?doqs=1

Back then it was offered for around 3M. Sold now, and was not as beautiful as in the pictures when we went to look, as

the pictures were apparently taken a few years earlier by a semi-professional photographer friend of the man selling, when the owner maintained it better.

Nice place, but a bit too secluded, so Mrs. Awk was worried, and I also, for her if nothing else as I am frequently abroad for work.

The place we are looking at now is much less secluded, and has at least one friendly neighbour immediately nearby. Will also make it prudent for us to have a respectable dog, which I have always wanted to have. More neighbours are also nearby, a stone throw and a river/bridge crossing away.

There is just no way to find anything similar to what we are looking at now in a gated community/moo ban. We've been renting in one for 3-4 years, and as somebody else said, we can shake hands with the neighbours out the window, without getting out of bed. Most Thai's seem to be happy living like that, but I am not, and fortunately, neither is Mrs. Awk.

We can perhaps buy 5-6 moo ban plots instead of one plot, to get some space, but not possibly economically. Also we will need to pay the moo ban fee, usually per talang wah of land. For some places (e.g., Serene lake, half way to hang dong), that can become a substantial amount, almost like renting a place somewhere. Even then, the land would be only a fraction of the size we are looking at now. Not that we have any current plans for all that land, but it would be nice to be able to grow some of ones own vegetables. Currently, this and the surrounding land is used for growing beans. I like beans, but not that much. Might have to start enjoying beans more though, as financially things will be rather dry during the next years, even if things go more or less as hoped. Perhaps Salsa Kitchen will offer to buy some beans from me, seeing as I am a semi-regular there again now. Or at least give me a discount if I bring my own beans to the table.

I guess your only financing the land, not a deal that involves building a house?

Yes, that is correct. It seems not all banks are interested in that. E.g., Kasikorn wasn't interested in talking with Mrs. Awk once they understood she was only applying for a loan for the land.

^ I can't tell if you think that's way too high or way too low.

Anyway, lots of variables. But land without public road access, far from electricity and quite likely half an hour's drive from town shouldn't really be more. Same distance but with road access and electricity nearby then you're up to double that amount.

Winnie, your statement troubles me somewhat. But we have during the last 4 months looked at a fair amount of land and house, and unless all of that has been incredibly overpriced (some if it, though perhaps none of the things showed by our agent, I would say had an owner more than a little optimistic regarding his price), this land, in it's current idylic surroundings (yes, who knows how it will change in 5-10 years) instantly struck me as a great deal. Our agent, though I realise we should not trust him to much, also thinks so, and he has been honest about other things as far as I can tell.

One of the steps remaining for a bank is for us to pay the bank 2,500 for them to do an appraisal of the land. I guess they will wait till next week, when I will drop of a the remaining documents the bank wants; a paper from my off-shore employer stating I am duly employed at the company. The appraisal paper, which we to my great surprise will not be allowed to get or keep, even though we are paying for it, I assume will give an indication on whether your guess is right or wrong. If it is wrong, I will of course not hold it against you, as I have tried to not provide too many details here, at least before the deal is finialised, or we have walked away. Thus I understand it is more than a little difficult to make a decent guesstimate for you. Appreciated none the less, as a warning flag to be aware of for us.

I find it rather annoing that Bangkok Bank insists we will not get the appraisal paper, but instead say some nonsense about it being a company secret. That means we will have to pay for the same appraisal at other banks no doubt, if we want to see if we can get a better deal there. The BB guy also told Mrs. Awk all banks provide the same terms, and the only difference regards when/how much we pay at the start of the loan period. Also sounds like nonsense to me.

Find the main guy who is in charge of this area, I can not remember what they call him. Head man something like this. your Thai wife should know what I mean . He is the guy in that area that everything goes through. He will make sure it is all legal in the neighborhood. Sounds like you already have things going correct.

"puu yai ban" I guess. Thank you, we've talked with him and he says everything is ok, for whatever that means.

Just got done talking to my Thai girl friend and she say basically, No road no buy. She thinks that at anytime one of the land owners could block your access and you would have to go to court . She owns land and is building a rental property so I would say make sure you have all your paper work in order because if someone sells and the road is on there land you may find yourself in a real pickle. Let us know how it works out.

Thanks for that. Further investigation has revelaed that all the road/dirt track to the land we are looking at has been donated to public use ("saa-taa-ra-na" is the word Mrs. Awk uses), and the land office also confirms this to Mrs. Awk. Seems some of the original owners, who later split up the land for giving to their relatives, thought about this problem, some 20 years ago. At least it appears so.

Some people in the local Chiang Mai forum have previosuly recommended a laywer, so I hope to contact her and get her to verify everything again before the final step of paying.

HI i do not want to mingle with the palace that you will built and give to your wife but your whole plan its sounds rather complicated and after its all done i am sure you be a frustrated person..Also what ever amount u have in mind for this project just triple it.Then also triple the construction period..

Did u know that isolated farang occupied homes usually get robbed ran sacked couple times a year ? You will need many dogs for protection cause usually they get poisoned.

How about tell your wife that you changed your mind instead of this plot in no mans land you will buy a completed freehold condo with views over the ping river in your own name....Lets see how excited she be with that new plan

Then You can start enjoying your life in paradise country immediately

Yes, that would certainly be easier by far. Mrs. Awk has also suggested that a couple of times, since I apparently "worry too much". Also she thinks it would be nice to stay in an aparment inside the city, rather than out in the boonies. But with a couple of small children, and my wish for dog and a cat, and reasonable garden to play in, an apartment is unfortunatly not something that would be satisfying. When I will in 20 years retire, it will be nice to have a garden to take care of, with enough space to build a small house for the mia noi also.

We are looking at a plot of land which does not have direct access from public road. The access is via an unpaved dirt track that has apparently been in use for many years. In total there is perhaps around 10 owners using various lengths of this dirt track/road.

Yes, this is obviously not ideal, but we've been looking for land and/or house for a while, and within our price bracket, this is by a very far stretch the best we've found. That is the reason I did not immediately drop any further consideration of the land when I found out that the road leading of it is private. As it is, it's very unlikely that we will be able to find anything similar in our somewhat limited price bracket, and thus I would appreciate any tips on how to go about this in the safest way.

We will need to use about 300 meters of the road, and pass through land owned by four other people, to access the land we are looking at. The road continues further inwards after these 300m, for use by owners further in, but that is of no concern to us I gather.

The first 150-200m of the road, i.e. the first 150-200m of the road we use, has been donated by the owner as some sort of public use. Not exactly sure how/what, but was told this evening that the owner of the land we are looking at has a copy of the paper where that donation is specified. Will investigate this further of course, but for now assume this donation is registered where it needs to be registered, and that the first half of the 300m of road/dirt track we need to use for access, will not pose any problem. That is one of the four owners whos land we will need to pass over.

The other three owners have previously given a verbal permission for our right of access, and have said they will accompany us, with the owner of the land we are looking at, to have this properly registered at the chanote(s) at the land office. As we are told it, the various land plots have been owned by a few families through many generations, all are friends, and thus right of access has never been an issue brought up, nor do they have any objects to registering that right of access formally. They all consider it to be a public road, but I would of course like to have our access formalised.

After our real estate agent (which appears to be a decent fellow, as far as I can tell after meeting with him occasionally during the last 3-4 months) has verified everything, I will also attempt to find a decent lawyer to verify it again before we eventually all trot down to the land office. Before we get there I would appreciate some tips however, which will hopefully also help me judge whether the lawyer I eventually deal with knows his stuff or not.

My question is what kind of access does the right of access grant? Obviously there must be some limit, as I don't assume I can demand to drive an 18-wheeler through there, if that should be my normal mode of transportation for popping down to the local 7-11. Should a right of access registration specify the width of access? We have a normal car and we would like to drive that to the land of course. If at some point a disgruntled neighbour, perhaps most likely a future owner, should want to interpret "right of access" as being "right to access by foot", is that something he can do? And if so, how do we avoid that to make sure we can drive a regular car to our land?

Best would of course be if we could buy some more land, enough to make a road to our plot, but that may not be possible here, though we are still investigating the possibilities here.

Many thanks for any feedback.