Thailand ranked among the top 6 places in the world to retire

[vandeventer]

3 hours ago, Rampant Rabbit said:

Well now  they know EVERYONE  is  flocking they can up the price for that incredible privelege

Anything is possible with France than Canada being number 1 & 2, I would sooner retire in Timbuktu.

[0815]

Another missleading BS headline here.
If I am searching , does it mean that I will go there ?

[MRToMRT]

Like others have said, it used to be but probably just clinging on to the "list" at the moment.

 

As a retiree I think most of my cohorts (well non asian anyway) are looking for a few standard requirements in a retirement location: good weather; reasonable cost of living; good health care; easy visas; lawful; good travel connections; low taxation; and good mix of developed and under developed.

In my time here as a retiree all of those here has either not quite lived up to expectations or gotten worse with the big exception of local taxation. 

 

I think its probably still very high amongst certain retirement groups especially those married to Thai or wanting a Thai relationship, those who want to party and those who have the tropical dream (but have not realised how much sweat comes with it).

 

[freedomnow]

When I'm older - give me Portugal over Thailand any day.

 

Stable rules, safe roads, good air, decent seasonal weather.

 

If i did not have a girlfriend tie to Thailand,  it would be off to Vietnam when it opens in the meantime.

 

Thailand is the old story now I'm afraid....only the fattest retiree wallets will survive along with their oxygen masks.

[John77]

I agree with all those who commented here. The headline is a joke and fake news. Out of curiosity I perused various websites and saw many where Thailand was not listed at all. I did see one where it was #10. Here's one from a 2021 article:
------------------------------------------------

Top 10 Countries for Retirement in 2021 based on climate, political system, urban infrastructure, healthcare, business support, affordable buying/renting real estate, cost of living and benefits for pensioners.

 

1. Costa Rica, 2. Panama, 3. Mexico, 4. Colombia, 5. Portugal, 6. Ecuador, 7. Malaysia, 8. France, 9. Malta, 10. Vietnam

Source: immigrantinvest.com/en/insider/best-places-to-retire-2021

[Rampant Rabbit]

2 hours ago, blazes said:

The fact that Canada is #2 shows how absurd this survey is.  As a Canadian I can assure anyone who wants to hear that this is the last place in the world one would want to immigrate to post-65.

 

One could rant on about the corrupt and brain-dead Prime Minister, but one need go no further than look into real estate costs in any one of the four  most desirable cities to live in.  Canadians can only afford housing if they have inherited a sh!teload of money, are old and have spent a lifetime paying off the mortgage, are Chinese capitalists, are drug rich, or able to pay down a mortgage that costs over 70% of household income. Plus...

surveys more reliable than this show that 50% of Canadians would be in serious financial trouble if interest rates were to rise a mere 1/4 percent.

 

I will say nothing about the weather, which is bearable year-round only on the British Columbia west coast.  And the less said about the medical system the better.

 

So, bah humbug to this ludicrous survey....

Thats  my  lumberjack dream down the pan then

[crazykopite]

Just read the report it say’s the majority of Brits want to retire to Spain or Portugal did I miss something there are a lot better places than Thailand that you can retire to I would never of put it into the Top Six has a brown envelope found it’s way to the author I did read that the PM was presenting gifts to some has been actor for promoting Thailand as a wonderful place 

[HAPPYNUFF]

I recently, out of pure curiosity, did a Google search  on Mongolia.  Does that mean I now intend to migrate there???

[Tonypandy]

4 hours ago, Rampant Rabbit said:

Well now  they know EVERYONE  is  flocking they can up the price for that incredible privelege

Nobody will flock in, according to earlier reports international airlines have handed back 80% of landing slots to the main Thai airports for flights between end October and end of March. 

[Rampant Rabbit]

1 minute ago, Tonypandy said:

Nobody will flock in, according to earlier reports international airlines have handed back 80% of landing slots to the main Thai airports for flights between end October and end of March. 

sarcasm old  fella

[Bangkok Barry]

4 hours ago, 86Tiger said:

I don't see correlation between terms typed in search engine seeking information to the jump determining top places to retire.

I was going to write the same. How many searched, looked at Thailand and then decided to avoid it like the plague. A search means nothing at all. Nothing.

[Thunglom]

4 hours ago, webfact said:

Although Brexit means the process of moving to Europe for Brits is now slightly different, it is still possible for UK citizens to retire to France. 

Post Brexit you need a long term visa for France - before you could basically just move in and stay.

In France,  expats need to show they can at least match the local minimum wage, For 2021 this is €18,655, but falls to €14,667 once social insurance charges have been deducted. The French authorities will use the lower figure, which works out at around £12,550 a year at current exchange rates.

That is above today’s new basic State Pension of £9,339 a year, so expats must show they can generate income from investments and retirement savings. "A couple with two State Pensions should be okay,” he said.

Portugal also demands Brits have enough income to match its national minimum wage, currently €7,980 (£6,838 a year) for an individual and €11,970 (£10,250) for a couple.

As this sort of thing applies throughout the Eu, places like Thailand have gained in interest as anyone retiring outside UK will have to apply for a visa wherever they go now.

Edited October 25, 2021 by Thunglom

[Andycoops]

Clearly, when they get the chance to look into all the requirements and paperwork and fees etc 

it will drop out of the rankings.

[mvdf]

A search is not a decision. So the ranking is based on number of searches. How scientific. World class empirical methodology indeed.

[stoutfella]

"The survey, titled Where the world wants to retire, found that Thailand was the most searched destination for a total of 9 countries. ".

 

Note, only "SEARCHED " not necessarily pursued.

[Thunglom]

4 hours ago, RichardColeman said:

Very misleading headline - it's NOT 6th in the top most places to retire in, it's 6th in the most searched on google to retire in.

 

Probably after searching and seeing hoops and visa laws , they decide against it !

with Google planner you are able to study "large numbers" - this is the key to correlation and just a cursory glance at sites that release figures will show you that the correlation is very good.

however this little survey is done even year and is really more for entertainment although Google Planner is a serious tool.

[wwest5829]

I certainly could not recommend anyone to apply for an O-A Visa for reason of retirement through the Royal Thai Embassy in their own country.

[denis911]

4 hours ago, Wiggy said:

Spot on. I was just about to post the same thing. 

Same here, maybe 10 years ago it was ranked fairly high, but since the Military tried running the country and more recently the Covid 19 debacle and now this misread ludicrous survey, but TIT.

[Tropposurfer]

I love it here ☺️ ... but hey I got hit in the head a lot as a kid so maybe that explains my rosy glasses view of the place ... hahahha ... what were we talking about again ??? lol lol ????????????????

 

If one wishes to promote a narrative that Thailand is somehow unique, or more extreme in its nationalism and its ethnic rejection and biases towards other nationalities than others, then this would be, in my much travelled and world lived opinion, a false narrative.

I too like some other OP's bend like bamboo and see the differences in culture and Thai forms of bias for exactly what they are; Another form of the same weird biases and prejudices that exist in my own culture ... on and on it can go ...

As for security and alternatives in where to live I have place in Aussie if I had to leave, so (we) are lucky to have that.

The location of Thailand is central to most of the globe, so as regular world traveller's perfect for us. We wouldn't want to have to leave but say if the junta turned to an extreme fascist ideology and it became literally life threatening anarchy, if we had to, we could just leave and let the home go without loosing our collective shirt.

As a retiree here I enjoy a wonderful, very high standard, free as a bird, healthy, chill lifestyle. Laws and IO are not a problem ... I have great Thai friends here and we help each other mutually and together we help others less fortunate than us. It's amazing when we give from our hearts just how intimate relations can be with Thai people. Learning the language is a great tool for being part of rather than seperate from.

 

As for the felt and ideated complaints of being 'criminalised' by rules etc. most, many many countries around the globe require and impose very strict rules and reg's on foreigners dossing down in their lands, mine being one.

Other nations (England is awash with surveillance cameras - ala 1984), and electronically advanced nations biometric you 'up the wazzoo' from your very first visa/ embassy contact via your passport, and all use cameras and other forms of electronic surveillance. 

One of the reasons the observing is so obvious here is because of the poverty of the nation making their systems paper and process heavy, and yes, quaint, clumsy, and require what we see as too much annoying face-to-face contact.

Naturally  this is very obvious as opposed to the discreet surveillance in my country. The bureaucratic paper heavy, time consuming system employs lots of people who would not have a job if not for pushing paper from here to there. India is the same.

In my homeland its a total pain too. Fee's for everything and its just another form of bribe and and only seems less so simply because its white people who look and sound like me doing the bureaucratic prodding and fleecing.

The bribery, and 'strange ubiquitous fee' system is also and extension of a class system (no different whatsoever for the class systems in western countries) in so-far as the have-nots don't survive without bending to exploitation or doing the exploiting.

Sorry to burst some bubbles but how much jingoistic denial do you have to be in to consider western countries as different, better, more advanced, less oppressive, and more honest than Thailand.

I've talked with educated Thai friends often about these things and they being western educated, very smart, and well-healed enough to be able to negotiate this ' national Thainess' and speak from a worldly place and tell me it is definitely these things I mention as well as many other complex historical sociological issues at play.

One of the consistent things my Thai friends tell me that brings grief and prejudicial behaviour to falang's is an assumed and mostly unaware, reflexive manner or the 'air' of white-pre-eminence and supremacy. Part of the supremacy-think is that others 'should' seem and do things they way they know.

It is hard for white folks to grasp that we do not, are not, and have not a pre-ordained right to be deferred to by another races unlike ours, and more importantly that our ways are not inherently superior.

 

The B'mmer cars are to catch people who overstay, immigration law defying crim's, as well as crim's of Thai nationality too. These cameras are NOT to spy on as a mechanism to oppress law abiding expat people. 

If you see the catching of visa overstayers by the B'mmer method as harassment of falang's then I seriously suggest you have a distorted sense of theirs and your importance in the world. Perhaps the very pre-eminence I mention above.

Personally I have zero to be paranoid about, to hide, to need to keep secret from, or fear (other than the fear often associated with the existential truth of having no control over anything except what I think and feel) from my own government or Thailand's so I don't worry if they ask me to report, which through my visa support is as easy a making a cup of tea. For those who have to drive and wait in IO offices then I commend and support the OP attitude who sees it as a nice days outing. 

It is an existential truth that it is I who gives power to another over me. Like the Buddha said; no attachment then there is little to no suffering.

 

[Burma Bill]

5 hours ago, webfact said:

The country ranked 6th place out of 142 countries

Fair enough, but 20 years ago when I retired to LOS I am sure its position would have been higher - no bureaucratic hassle with visas in those days and 80 baht to 1 GBP!!

[3NUMBAS]

unstable banana republic with another junta in charge ,dont think so

[3NUMBAS]

with 80% of slots at the airport now  unwanted by airlines sounds a lot diferent now ..they dont see much hope

[Blumpie]

Canada?  Canada???? To retire?  Ha ha ha!

This place is an arctic wasteland!  

[Thingamabob]

Retired in Thailand 30 years ago. Still very happy here. No regrets. 

[malt25]

Top Place.....

Top | Definition of Top by Merriam-Webster

https://www.merriam-webster.com › dictionary › top

Search for: What is the mean by top?

What is the meaning of top position?

Informal a position for sexual intercourse in which the man lies on top of the woman and they are face to face.   And there you have it !

[Jingthing]

3 minutes ago, Blumpie said:

Canada?  Canada???? To retire?  Ha ha ha!

This place is an arctic wasteland!  

Not exactly. There are very nice more temperate places such as Vancouver Island. However there is no visa option for foreigners to retire there so it doesn't belong on the list.

Edited October 25, 2021 by Jingthing

[Crok]

Who took part in this survey? Obviously not anyone who has retired here. The Govt takes every step possible to make it difficult to retire in Thailand. Having gone through all the steps to retire in Thailand several years ago and was out of the country when the borders were closed because of Covid and not able to return  I have found that my visas, permits, driving licence and other documentation have been cancelled and can only be renewed when I return to Thailand in three weeks time. I have to start all over again. But my tax file number is still operative.????

[Blumpie]

8 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

Not exactly. There are very nice more temperate places such as Vancouver Island. However there is no visa option for foreigners to retire there so it doesn't belong on the list.

Ha ha ha I lived in Vancouver and Victoria.  You only know when spring is coming when the rain feels warmer.  

To retire there is not in the cards for most.  I know many people go south to Phoenix AZ they sure don't stay here!  

[Isaan sailor]

For me, I think the mighty Teflon Baht needs to go south about 5% more.  Then you’d have a shot at retirement haven status. Did not like today’s western currency thrashing.

[Gabor56]

For what reason could France the best in these years? Have they ever tried 90 days checking having a health problem? Line up for nothing?