jojothai

My Thai wife has just finished chemotherapy on the Thai Health system for breast cancer, in hua hin As people have commented , we pay so little that we are very luky. But It was very hard getting everything approved through the system to start. My wife did extremely well getting all the Tests and verifications from home province, home district and original surgery in Bangkok Hospital. She has a strong will, but it still caused much hardship. Its also hard because the state hospitals are so crowded and you need to get there early in the Queue, before 7am. Then you may be there most of the day. She has just started follow up laser treatment in Ratchaburi. Same issue hospital swamped with people from about 7am. We aim to get there by 7am, even though she has started the ball rolling. I commend what is provided under the Thai system, but FYI its hard going through all the bureaucracy and very long waits at the hospitals.

Yes, you are correct . I stand to be corrected, but we are talking about the new rule changes here and if tax returns will now be required. There is likely to be a lot more attention from the TRD for any remittances.

Yes, that may have been the situation in the past. The tax requirement on remittances change is from 1st jan 2024. So its only after the end of this tax year that we will find out how if and what happens.

Why would they have declared the remittances? The remittance tax change was from 1st jan 2024. So there has been no need for the retirees using the income method to file tax returns previously. But the remittances became a taxable amount this year, then the retirees soon have to decide what to do. Next year we should expect to start to see how this develops.

At present tax only applies to money transmitted from abroad or earned here. So if you transmitted money then the Oz return should help to avoid double taxation on the amount. but unfortunately the tax year here is different.its the end of the year, so its hard to know what they will tell you they need. If they introduce tax on global income one of the problems is how we will deal with end of tax year here. If UK is end of tax year april, people will not yet have their uktax return for the requirements period end of thai taxyear at 31 december. It will be necessary to show income from january to end of the year, and how any DTA calculation of tax paid elsewhere can be made. God only knows how this will work out.

Cancelled post. I used a quote but it did not show. Have to re-do.

How can anybody believe things reported in the media when some of the text is nonsense. "commencement of rail construction isn’t expected for five years. This schedule pushes the anticipated operational date to 2029, reflecting a five-year setback, reported Bangkok Post." So how does operation start when construction may only be starting in five years. Is that not late 2029?

Be aware that you can only book online up to the day before and not on the day of travel. when you book online you can also choose a seat, after confirmed paying the booking.

When you get out at the clock tower (free trip in the van), marvest is a 500m walk, Or you can get a motorbike, There are some at the clock tower. Should only cost 20 baht, or 30 baht at most.

if you want to be near the beach but out of town. See map for Khao Takiap area where i looked for houses. Some places town houses, but at the lower part there were some fairly good looking houses. Not that many but worth a look if you want to be near the beach. Its not far to the songthaew turning point for getting into town, up to about 500m.

Another note to add for people thinking of moving here. It gets extremely hot several months of the year. Just like many parts of Thailand. Think of the orientation of the house / condo. Look at a adjacent places to see how crowded they are with blinds for the sun and in which directions. Its nice having a sea view condo, but you can have unbearable heat through windows. Sun comes up south east in the morning and is very hot. Sun sets to WNW, hottest mid afternoon around west. You may not think it too important, as we did when we bought our place. However we found the heat getting into the kitchen area and some other rooms was much higher than we like. There were blinds inside the windows but they don't do much. The aluminium window frames get so hot you should not touch them. In hind sight I should have noticed all the houses in the village with blinds outside and windows obviously covered on the inside. I fitted roller blinds outside and they stop the problem, sunblocking 99%, that you can see out but not see in.

Its a good suggestion. That area north of town and out to Soi 2 has houses. Beach side you could also look around Naebkehart Road soi 41 to 51. I think there are houses there, but not too many. Me and my thai wife need to go out regularly to the south and looked primarily at south and west side of Hua hin.

You may have a problem if you want it to be nice. There are a lot of predominantly Thai areas but they are primarily either older town houses or run down and insecure housing estates. I would not trust living in most of the town houses you have no idea what neighbours you will get or security. Many places have barred windows. The housing estates i have seen that are more thai are very poorly maintained. Look along soi 102 about and the Sois off it, about 3km out. If you want to be close to the beach you need to look around the area into Khao Takiab. Right at the end not far from the temple. Past the turning point for the SongThaews That is an area i remember that may meet what you want. I looked at a couple of houses there that were not bad, but we chose a beautiful peaceful and well maintained village 3km out that does have many falangs but it is Thai run.. Your best bet may be to get a condo, but condo prices in my opinion are relatively more expensive. Maybe look at cha-am if you want to be away from people. If you want thais, then be prepared to put up with the potential noise. The so called Ghetto area is mainly around the Hilton which gets crowded with older people. That is not representative of Hua Hin. There are some of the bar areas such as soi 88 and 94 also frequented by a lot of older falangs but many places in Thailand have similar. When i go into town on soi 88 there are very few falang places until you get into town. But, very few places to think of living. Some people may think that Market Village is crowded with older falangs but that is not the case, unless that is all you want to identify. The restaurant on the pier that we go to often is adjacent to the Hilton "Ghetto area". It often has just as many thais or younger tourists as there are older tourists. It can hardly be declared a ghetto.

I agree that the swanky developments out of town may not be what they appear, and there is the issue of transportation in and outof town. However, some developments are very good. People must rent here before buying. Rents for houses are cheap IMHO, and as a renter you do not pay CAM fees Even then CAM fees in houses are often cheaper than condos. I pay just under 30,000 baht a year in a village that is run excellently and i have a 3 bed villa. You will pay that or more in a 100sqm condo. Estates do not all add cost to utilities. Where i have the villa we pay what the utility charge is and no extra. Your comments are valid thanks, because people need to know these things when they look around.

Try telling that to all the tourists that come here repeatedly and love it. And the thais that are buying up all the 30 sqm condos and swarm here on holidays. Thats more of a problem to note. Especially for the traffic. From what i know here. I honestly cannot understand where the hang up comes from . Pattaya has far more retirees and i know some places that may be considered ghettos. There maybe many retirees here and for good reason, but IMHO after 2.5 years here i dont believe that it should be considered a ghetto.