Report Thailand Tightens Grip on Retirement Visas Amid Wealth Shift

[thesetat]

On 6/5/2025 at 9:02 AM, Hummin said:

Some people do have the money, and renting a nice flat in Bangkok with location and view, easily reaches 65k a month. 

 

If I lived in Bangkok, or had to live in Bangkok, I would be willing to spend quite a bit on the right location with facilities to live comfortably. 

 

 

Yes... but do you think those people live above their means? Are they renting those places without sufficient money to cover everything else? Your point is moot

[Yumthai]

27 minutes ago, TroubleandGrumpy said:

Yes it can and it will - see my post above. But IMO it will not be a problem for 99% Expats - probably - I think - I hope. 

If you think global taxation will be implemented but 99% of residents won't be impacted then it's a non-event.

[Gilligan In Drag]

This would be  a much better article if it focussed on the useful bits, that there are plenty of alternatives for older people to Thailand. Its kin dof click baity isnt it? Theres been no pivot recently, so why suggest that there has been.

 

But  I apprecite the info on other countries, needed a reminder and a sense that i am current on what it is eksewhere for older people. I did not realize Cambodia did not require money in the bank etc and only wants 300 hundred dollars per year(?) or something. I've been to Cambodia for holidays and seems like a pretty good place, I much prefer the shady leafy riverside vibe of certain parts of Phnom Penh to denuded, concrete jungle Thailand. If I werent married and on that visa, it'd be a no brainer. I think what i dont like too is the shiftiness of everything in Thailand, you just feel that any day they are going slam the door on your stay with your family, it is something you have to watch unfortunately so I really dont appreciate being click baited, its just one more irritating drop in the bucket.

[Hummin]

3 hours ago, thesetat said:

Yes... but do you think those people live above their means? Are they renting those places without sufficient money to cover everything else? Your point is moot

My impression most people try to live within their own limits, if not it will go to hell sooner or later one way or the other

[Marco100]

What's changed in the Retirement O 1 year Visa ? By law you always had to have 800 K THB in YOUR Bank Account n in your name for at least 3 months before renewal  . The rest is normal burocratical identification.  Lease Agreement . Place of stay . M30 . 

Having a good Insurance is recommended.  You would be stupid running around Thailand without an adeguate Insurance. 

So' what has changed ?

That they added an LTR ? 

There has been decades of Elite Visas who covered the Wealthy.  Now they just added a new LTR who is cheaper than the Elite Visa and is welcome ! 

Meanwhile Various other longterm Visas has added .

What is changed for the OA 1 year retirement visa ? Please explain?

[kimamey]

Sounds a great idea but I'm sure the push to attract higher value had been reported several times before. Anyway, as I said its a terrific plan and I think it should be tried elsewhere. Hotels should add at least  50% to their prices to ensure they only get the higher class of guests. Street vendors could double their prices so they get classier customers. Bars could draw in superior drunks by using the same methods. Imagine how wonderfully uplifting the roads of Thailand could be with all the high net worth drivers of quadruple priced 2, 3 and 4 wheel automotive products. 

I really don't know why businesses haven't thought of this themselves. At least now the government has given them this fantastic idea.

 

Yes I am being sarcastic, or at least I think I am

[OldBird]

Does this effect Marriage visa at all?  I switched from retirement to marriage visa a few years ago. In my mind these are two separate visa. 

[ignis]

something has changed, met up with my Cousin again

 

Last week of May he went as normal to the Embassy in London to get a new  Retirement 1 year Visa,   They he and his late wife have had the 1 year Retirement Visa for years

This time they wanted a letter from his Government Pension - they would not give a new Visa as his pension did not meet the NEW amount needed...

Appears they were only interested in Pension, not that he could prove he had many 1,000s of £ in investments

 

He said they were helpful so this time has a Tourists Visa + was told that there was no problem [new rules] on Visa on arrival anymore..  he spends 4/5 weeks in Malaysia + spends 4/5 weeks in Australia + 4 weeks in New Zealand  with weeks in-between in Thailand  as a base  + Feb - end May in UK  every year

 

This last week he went to his Bank here = loads of problems  one of the main ones they Bank says  now MUST have a Thai phone number !!

[Peter Crow]

17 hours ago, JackGats said:

Good for you  if you can make it stick.

 

My LTR visa was ignored (brushed aside) by TRD when I filed taxes and asked for a dividend refund this year, as described here in a dedicated thread some weeks ago.

So you paid tax on your remitted overseas income?

[NanLaew]

54 minutes ago, OldBird said:

Does this effect Marriage visa at all?  I switched from retirement to marriage visa a few years ago. In my mind these are two separate visa. 

 

No, and neither of them are visas either.

[JackGats]

6 hours ago, Peter Crow said:

So you paid tax on your remitted overseas income?

I did. I "paid" the tax with the dividend refund TRD owed me. Luckily I had only remitted about 12k USD last year. Had I remitted twice or three times that, the dividend refund would only have covered about 1/3rd of the due tax.

 

This year (2025) I'll duck the 180-day mark while availing myself of my non-resident status to transfer more cash. Next year (2026) I'll thus file no taxes but I'll remember to get a "certificate of travel record" for 2025 from IO just in case. As of 2026 my plan is to live off my hoarded cash for 3 or 4 years. Later, if need be, rinse and repeat.

 

I cherish my LTR visa for the immigration hassle it spares me but I now know its much-publicized "tax-exemption of foreign assets" is a non-starter.

[lordgrinz]

29 minutes ago, JackGats said:

I did. I "paid" the tax with the dividend refund TRD owed me. Luckily I had only remitted about 12k USD last year. Had I remitted twice or three times that, the dividend refund would only have covered about 1/3rd of the due tax.

 

This year (2025) I'll duck the 180-day mark while availing myself of my non-resident status to transfer more cash. Next year (2026) I'll thus file no taxes but I'll remember to get a "certificate of travel record" for 2025 from IO just in case. As of 2026 my plan is to live off my hoarded cash for 3 or 4 years. Later, if need be, rinse and repeat.

 

I cherish my LTR visa for the immigration hassle it spares me but I now know its much-publicized "tax-exemption of foreign assets" is a non-starter.

 

Since my wife works, and gets paid fairly well, any income I send over (which is applied to our tax return) starts immediately in the 25% bracket, and would quickly hit the 30% bracket.

[Peter Crow]

26 minutes ago, JackGats said:

I cherish my LTR visa for the immigration hassle it spares me but I now know its much-publicized "tax-exemption of foreign assets" is a non-starter.

What they did is clearly illegal, you ought to hire legal help to reclaim your tax. There is one law firm in Silom, one of the 4 BOI certified 4 agencies, who are also doing tax work. That's where I'd start, with a near certainty to win, but up to you.

 

A Royal decree is Law. If you have an LTR/WP visa any income  remitted in years following  the year of earning, is tax exempt.

 

[Jack1988]

In my opinion, rich people do not come to live in thailand, they choose rich places

Don't get me wrong, I still like thailand but it has changed and i keep thinking that it would be better to stay for some months and then just leave, then repeat the process when you want. There are also other south east asian countries

[JackGats]

37 minutes ago, Peter Crow said:

What they did is clearly illegal, you ought to hire legal help to reclaim your tax. There is one law firm in Silom, one of the 4 BOI certified 4 agencies, who are also doing tax work. That's where I'd start, with a near certainty to win, but up to you.

 

A Royal decree is Law. If you have an LTR/WP visa any income  remitted in years following  the year of earning, is tax exempt.

 

My saga started with my signing up with a tax-filing agency. Said agency not only ignored my LTR status in their filing draft, but on top of that they wanted to file imaginary amounts that matched neither remittance nor dividends! After I decided I'd much better file myself, it was an uphill struggle to get that agency to hand over to me the password of my own eFiling account (loss of face you see). The long and the short of it is, I'm in no hurry to get involved with any (tax-filing or law) agency in TH ever again. In TH you "take a lawyer" and before you know it you find youself having to sue your lawyer.

 

As to the Royal decree being Law, yes it is but what Law are we talking about? With the help of a friend who is proficient in Thai, we endeavoured to find out what kind of income the Royal Decree is actually exempting (quite apart from the "following year" charade). Well guess what? It is as clear as mud. A world away from the blanket tax-exemption on foreign income/assets you see plastered all over the Internet. All it would have taken is for the Royal Decree to specify: "foreign income exempted" (with the possible caveat about the following year). It doesn't though, instead it waffles about "assessable income" and such like.

 

[Jack1988]

7 hours ago, OldBird said:

Does this effect Marriage visa at all?  I switched from retirement to marriage visa a few years ago. In my mind these are two separate visa. 

you switched to a marriage visa because you don't have the 800k for the retired extension financial requirement

[Peter Crow]

4 hours ago, JackGats said:

As to the Royal decree being Law, yes it is but what Law are we talking about? With the help of a friend who is proficient in Thai, we endeavoured to find out what kind of income the Royal Decree is actually exempting (quite apart from the "following year" charade). 

 

Well, "assessable income under section 40 of the Revenue Code derived in the previous tax year from an employment, or from business carried on abroad, or from a property situated abroad, and brought into Thailand"  that's rather clear to me, even though it may leave out a few things, so just don't remit those.

 

But we might find out how things are going to unravel in the next couple of year. May become pointless if the proceed with new rules on remittances.

[ukrules]

4 hours ago, JackGats said:

As to the Royal decree being Law, yes it is but what Law are we talking about? With the help of a friend who is proficient in Thai, we endeavoured to find out what kind of income the Royal Decree is actually exempting (quite apart from the "following year" charade). Well guess what? It is as clear as mud.

 

Indeed, especially as the Royal Decree has not been published.

 

The first time you will read the Royal Decree is when it's published in the Gazette unless I'm mistaken - they are kept secret for some very good reasons.

 

Just realised that you're talking about the LTR visa Royal Decree aren't you - and yes that was never clear - but despite having plenty of money it would be difficult for me to get one of those as I refuse to invest in places which offer only a derisory return on investment, ie - Thailand.

[drkenchso]

air quality seems deteriorating not only in chiangmai but bangkok, not too sure if wealthy retiree like that, but cambodia also air pollution, phillipines and malaysia much.better in air quality,  the evolving worldwide income tax here to align with OECD? could also be seen by the wealthy overseas guy as problem, after all, wealthy guys have lots of choice to choose for retirement, not necessarily fixed in only one place or country

[Peter Crow]

30 minutes ago, ukrules said:

Indeed, especially as the Royal Decree has not been published.

We were referring to RD 743, which has been published in 2023.

[JackGats]

1 hour ago, Peter Crow said:

Well, "assessable income under section 40 of the Revenue Code derived in the previous tax year from an employment, or from business carried on abroad, or from a property situated abroad, and brought into Thailand"  that's rather clear to me, even though it may leave out a few things, so just don't remit those.

 

But we might find out how things are going to unravel in the next couple of year. May become pointless if the proceed with new rules on remittances.

Thank you for spelling it out: "from an employment, or from business carried on abroad, or from a property ". My foreign income is a pension + capital gains and savings, how does that fit in? Maybe (just maybe) part of it is indirectly "from an employment", but definitely not from business or property! The Royal Decree seems to me like it doesn't just leave out a few things. It leaves out a hell of a lot!

 

A far cry from the LTR hype trumpeting "no taxes on foreign assets/income"

[Peter Crow]

32 minutes ago, JackGats said:

Maybe (just maybe) part of it is indirectly "from an employment"

Section 40 of the revenue code includes pensions into "income from employment:

 

"(1) Income derived from employment, whether in the form of salary, wage, per diem, bonus, bounty, gratuity, pension, house rent allowance, monetary value of rent-free residence provided by an employer, payment of debt liability of an employee made by an employer, or any money, property or benefit derived from employment.^4"

 

Dunno about Capital gains, but savings made prior to January 2024 are exempted, even without LTR (Por 162).

[ronnie50]

On 6/8/2025 at 10:25 AM, fredwiggy said:

There of course are some foreigners living here who had jobs that raped the world's resources, moved rich clients money around, swindled others in scams, kicked others out of their homes and think they're big shots living here and having cash to burn, but oh, they're the "quality wealthy expats". 

Yes. Whatever happened to journalist Andrew Drummond? I know he moved back to UK to escape either authorities, libel charges, or worse.. But his investigations into the underbelly of farang life here was interesting (since no one else ever reports on it).