BOI Seeks Private Businesses to Promote LTR Visa Program

[Misty]

6 hours ago, LivinLOS said:

Good info.. I have been saying these are very shoddily legally documented.. Even the 'you dont need a work permit' part is not backed up by real law only the enforcement and the 'you dont owe taxes on non Thai income' is similarly not what the law says only what they say.. This is what elite used to claim too, then changed thier tune when pressed on it. 

They had the vision but they didnt actually do the work to create the clear legal framework (no surprises there !!). 

See this "Notification of the Ministry of Labor Subject: Permission for foreigners to work in the Kingdom as a special case"  at this link, #7 : https://ltr.boi.go.th/page/laws-regulations.html

[4MyEgo]

1 hour ago, NorthernRyland said:

I understand AU has some terrible property problems and probably bubbles. I don't know where to compare Chiang Mai to but it's not AU for sure.

 

I know I can find land cheaper outside of medium sized American cities for less than Chiang Mai though and  the average income is going to be at least 4 times higher than CM so I don't see how it's a good investment here.

 

For example I saw on Facebook this 1.2 Rai plot of land is selling for 12 million baht. This is an area where average income is something like 20k baht/month and mainly students. Crazy prices I don't understand.

 

https://goo.gl/maps/dMDXBP55rT8hXGN59

Totally understand where your coming from.

 

Looks like a development site having two street frontages and could probably maximize the lots one could put on it with lots facing the street on one side and lots facing the street on the other side.

 

Lets assume he could sub-divide the lots into 5 on one street side and 6 on the other street side, 11 lots = 110,000 baht each, not really that expensive, no doubt if that could be achieved and developed, there would certainly be some good coin to be made.

 

Some one once said to me, position, position, position is the key to good real estate investing, to which I replied, no, that is a saying, and actually, it's the zoning that is key to making money, although position position position does help.

 

If Thailand allowed foreigners to own land here, land would sky rocket, hence the reason I would buy.

[ThailandRyan]

1 hour ago, digger70 said:

Thank you ,I can't find the 5/10 Yr  retirement visa you are talking about in that Link. 

That link seems to be only for the Elite Visa.

What are you talking about there is  no elite visa in that link Sir. The Visa is a 10 year visa.  You obtain the 10 year Visa stamp in your passport and then you are actually stamped into the country for a 5 year period and given a multiple re-entry stamp as well.  Your confused.  Better do some more reading on the link I sent you. The visa I have is the LTR-WP or wealthy Pensioner Visa, it is stamped into my passport as an LTR-P. It's after the first 5 years you get re-stamped into Thailand for another 5 years at no cost since you paid upfront for 10 years.

 

Edited March 1, 2023 by ThailandRyan

[NorthernRyland]

7 minutes ago, 4MyEgo said:

Lets assume he could sub-divide the lots into 5 on one street side and 6 on the other street side, 11 lots = 110,000 baht each, not really that expensive, no doubt if that could be achieved and developed, there would certainly be some good coin to be made.

 

It's 12 million for the plot. The smallest sub division for a house is 50sq wah so if that's 1.5 Rai that's 600/50=12 plots @ 12,000,000/12 = 1 mil per lot. You'd have to sell something more in the 3+ million baht range I think for developers to make a profit.

 

 

[ThailandRyan]

48 minutes ago, Misty said:

See this "Notification of the Ministry of Labor Subject: Permission for foreigners to work in the Kingdom as a special case"  at this link, #7 : https://ltr.boi.go.th/page/laws-regulations.html

Some folks just don't get it @Misty, and will try and find fault with everything this country does as far as the Visas go.

[4MyEgo]

22 minutes ago, NorthernRyland said:

It's 12 million for the plot. The smallest sub division for a house is 50sq wah so if that's 1.5 Rai that's 600/50=12 plots @ 12,000,000/12 = 1 mil per lot. You'd have to sell something more in the 3+ million baht range I think for developers to make a profit.

 

 

My bad, looks like I left a zero off which makes sense, yes the developer would want to make at least 20% which would be like 2.5 mil per dwelling, depending on size, i.e. single level, perhaps 3 mil for a two level dwelling which would increase his margin.

[digger70]

1 hour ago, ThailandRyan said:

What are you talking about there is  no elite visa in that link Sir. The Visa is a 10 year visa.  You obtain the 10 year Visa stamp in your passport and then you are actually stamped into the country for a 5 year period and given a multiple re-entry stamp as well.  Your confused.  Better do some more reading on the link I sent you. The visa I have is the LTR-WP or wealthy Pensioner Visa, it is stamped into my passport as an LTR-P. It's after the first 5 years you get re-stamped into Thailand for another 5 years at no cost since you paid upfront for 10 years.

 

Thank you I will  check that . 

[NorthernRyland]

3 hours ago, 4MyEgo said:

My bad, looks like I left a zero off which makes sense, yes the developer would want to make at least 20% which would be like 2.5 mil per dwelling, depending on size, i.e. single level, perhaps 3 mil for a two level dwelling which would increase his margin.

Almost forgot another one. For anyone familiar with CM they made a new bypass road in Mae Rim on the 107 and my wife found a person selling a little over 1 Rai plot for 1 sq/wah @ 80,000 baht which totaled 47 million baht.  Type the location 18.907308339403883, 98.94318645582739 into Google to see it. I haven't been tracking property values in CM so I don't know but we may be in a  huge bubble here too.

 

[ThailandRyan]

22 minutes ago, NorthernRyland said:

Almost forgot another one. For anyone familiar with CM they made a new bypass road in Mae Rim on the 107 and my wife found a person selling a little over 1 Rai plot for 1 sq/wah @ 80,000 baht which totaled 47 million baht.  Type the location 18.907308339403883, 98.94318645582739 into Google to see it. I haven't been tracking property values in CM so I don't know but we may be in a  huge bubble here too.

 

Getting ready for the high speed railroad from China to come into the country and anything on the corridors are going sky high as far as prices and of course they are hoping that they sell and make money....you just can not make this speculatory issue up.

[Sydebolle]

Honet to God; do these people look across the border to see, what other countries are doing? 

Malaysia has (had?) a programme on five-years visa, first car tax-free, second car 50% tax, non-Malays can (could?) own ONE property, irrespective of room, condominium or house. 

The reason why that programme never really took of were those five-times-a-day "prayers" all over the land and, as there are plenty of such towers, people voted with their feet. 

Clean up your tremendously complicated immigration with all sorts of TM-forms from 1 - eternity. Grant one-year visas against presentation of a local health insurance and proof of means where a bank book updated on the day of application suffices. Charge THB 10'000/yearly for the visa which includes an automatic multiple re-entry, no TM30, no 90 days and no other funny ideas. Facilitate and streamline all those ridiculous forms. 
You can send at least 50% of the officers packing, do more online applications and you're getting there. 

Do not forget, the customer has the choice and Thailand is, the longer the more, in direct competition with other SEA nations, apart from African and Latin/South American alternatives ???? 

[LivinLOS]

On 3/1/2023 at 12:59 AM, NorthernRyland said:

What are you saying? Thailand has a 1% class just like anywhere. The question is can you get higher end pensioners and remote workers to move to Thailand in large numbers and the answer remains no.

I didnt mean Thais.. I meant wealthy expats and farangs.. 

[LivinLOS]

On 3/1/2023 at 7:37 AM, Misty said:

See this "Notification of the Ministry of Labor Subject: Permission for foreigners to work in the Kingdom as a special case"  at this link, #7 : https://ltr.boi.go.th/page/laws-regulations.html

Thanks.. Currently struggling to get that through google translator.. Will have another crack later when I have more time. 

I also like it when someone bothers to link actual source.. 

[LivinLOS]

On 3/1/2023 at 8:26 AM, ThailandRyan said:

Some folks just don't get it @Misty, and will try and find fault with everything this country does as far as the Visas go.

You obviously havent read much of what I post here and elsewhere, I think Thailand has created many great new high net worth categories (The OX is one few people seem to go for but looks great to me) and these are going in the right direction with higher demands but higher perks. That said they tend to be sloppily documented and implemented (OX long list of issues with OX differences in issuance and rules to retain)... Happy to see the link and will work to see whats documented here.. For some reason the translator was not working on that file. 

I can relate experience over the elite claims that you can work on the elite visa a long as it is remote work.. They make some very lawyer approved vague claims hints of this on the elite site, they then confirmed it 100% clearly in an email. When I then challenged that with both law, statements from labour dept and employment officials and the case of someone arrested / deported / blacklisted for working 100% online they came back with 'we think its ok, but we don't know its up to you to check'.. Further pushing had the person admit that it is illegal. The best part was when I wrote to them again a month later with a different email and asked the same question, the exact same person who had conceded it was not legal, wrote back again claiming it was legal to do so, fully aware of the law and now proven to be lieing to sell Elite visas. When you have the very advisors of these systems happy to flat out lie to sell things it puts in in perspective what you are dealing with. I can only relate for the LTR that I have spoken to people applying for the work from Thailand category and they had asked for a work permit exemption or legal proof and only got vague 'your not working in Thailand' (which is legally incorrect) answers. If this is the actual exemption then great it very much improves the standing. 

 

[LivinLOS]

17 hours ago, Sydebolle said:

Honet to God; do these people look across the border to see, what other countries are doing? 

Malaysia has (had?) a programme on five-years visa, first car tax-free, second car 50% tax, non-Malays can (could?) own ONE property, irrespective of room, condominium or house. 

Yeah and they have recently raised that to needing almost 250k USD (up from 30 - 35k USD) deposited in Malaysia as just one of the requirements.. And 4 x raised the income levels needed. 

Sounds like Thailand HAS been looking at it, and said they are not expensive enough and need to catch up. 

[Caldera]

The sluggish start of the Elite visa and the complete failure of the SMART visa program should have been taken seriously - and the reasons analyzed carefully - when they designed the LTR visa.

 

It was pretty clear that it would attract mostly people who would have already qualified for an existing visa. I'm not surprised that many retirees have reported that they've changed to the LTR for added convenience, but we haven't seen many (if any?) reports from people applying in the somewhat innovative remote worker category. That's because some of the requirements are insane, and they should have realized that long ago.

Edited March 3, 2023 by Caldera

[Misty]

1 hour ago, LivinLOS said:

You obviously havent read much of what I post here and elsewhere, I think Thailand has created many great new high net worth categories (The OX is one few people seem to go for but looks great to me) and these are going in the right direction with higher demands but higher perks. That said they tend to be sloppily documented and implemented (OX long list of issues with OX differences in issuance and rules to retain)... Happy to see the link and will work to see whats documented here.. For some reason the translator was not working on that file. 

I can relate experience over the elite claims that you can work on the elite visa a long as it is remote work.. They make some very lawyer approved vague claims hints of this on the elite site, they then confirmed it 100% clearly in an email. When I then challenged that with both law, statements from labour dept and employment officials and the case of someone arrested / deported / blacklisted for working 100% online they came back with 'we think its ok, but we don't know its up to you to check'.. Further pushing had the person admit that it is illegal. The best part was when I wrote to them again a month later with a different email and asked the same question, the exact same person who had conceded it was not legal, wrote back again claiming it was legal to do so, fully aware of the law and now proven to be lieing to sell Elite visas. When you have the very advisors of these systems happy to flat out lie to sell things it puts in in perspective what you are dealing with. I can only relate for the LTR that I have spoken to people applying for the work from Thailand category and they had asked for a work permit exemption or legal proof and only got vague 'your not working in Thailand' (which is legally incorrect) answers. If this is the actual exemption then great it very much improves the standing. 

 

My understanding from senior BoI folks is:  if you have an LTR visa you can legally work in Thailand.  If you work for a Thai company, you do need a work permit, but if you have the LTR visa you can get a long-term digital work permit. That's the case I fall under, so I have the LTR visa and a five year digital work permit, renewable for another 5 years when it expires. 

 

BoI senior staff (in seminars and direct meetings) have also told me that those who do not work for a Thai company can still legally work on the LTR visa, without a work permit since the work is being done for an overseas company.  Since I do work for a Thai company I'm not in that category, but if I were I'd check into that in more detail.

 

Either way, the LTR visa seems very different from the elite visas in this aspect. It's clear that legally the elite visas do not allow any work. Anyone with an elite visa wishing to work would need to get a new visa that permits work such as a NonB, and a separate work permit. Not the case with LTR.

[Misty]

27 minutes ago, Caldera said:

The sluggish start of the Elite visa and the complete failure of the SMART visa program should have been taken seriously - and the reasons analyzed carefully - when they designed the LTR visa.

 

It was pretty clear that it would attract mostly people who would have already qualified for an existing visa. I'm not surprised that many retirees have reported that they've changed to the LTR for added convenience, but we haven't seen many (if any?) reports from people applying in the somewhat innovative remote worker category. That's because some of the requirements are insane, and they should have realized that long ago.

Having gone through the LTR application process at the beginning, I can say it was rough going. The impression I had is that the BoI more or less had administration of the program foisted on them.  BoI was doing their best with limited resources, notably on the IT front.  It was what might be considered a "soft opening".  I can say that the BoI staff were incredibly courtesy and tried to help pretty much every step of the way, even though they too were struggling with the program design, lack of legal clarity, etc. 

 

Many of the initial issues those of us applying last year faced seem to have been worked out now. Perhaps this announcement of introducing intermediaries says the program is ready for prime time.

 

Senior gov't folks in seminars did say that the huge projected numbers for the program were pretty much aspirational.  It seem like the only way to get the program started was to have high targets.  I am glad they did.  For me, it's a huge improvement over what I dealt with before.

 

[LivinLOS]

On 3/3/2023 at 1:45 AM, Caldera said:

but we haven't seen many (if any?) reports from people applying in the somewhat innovative remote worker category. That's because some of the requirements are insane, and they should have realized that long ago.

I have chatted with a couple on some FB nomad groups but agree.. The Thai mindset of 'employees' and needing to be engaged by a huge non Thai entity is a massive limiting factor and really serves little purpose. It just comes back to that Thai mindset of 'degree' 'employment' 'corporate systems' etc etc which is not how the modern remote worker industry operates. 

[LivinLOS]

On 3/3/2023 at 2:10 AM, Misty said:

BoI senior staff (in seminars and direct meetings) have also told me that those who do not work for a Thai company can still legally work on the LTR visa, without a work permit since the work is being done for an overseas company.  Since I do work for a Thai company I'm not in that category, but if I were I'd check into that in more detail.

But this is the bit thats legally dubious.. Other visa offerings have made that claim also, yet it is a false claim in that case and is typical Thai 'lets just say thats the law' enforcement rather than legality. 

[Misty]

6 hours ago, LivinLOS said:

But this is the bit thats legally dubious.. Other visa offerings have made that claim also, yet it is a false claim in that case and is typical Thai 'lets just say thats the law' enforcement rather than legality. 

Well, I don't think it's a false claim in the case of the LTR visa. For example, I have an LTR visa. And I have a legally issued work permit.  This wouldn't be possible with other visa offerings such as the Elite or retirement NonO.