Paying For Condo

[alanw]

I have PR. There are many previous posts to this board indicating that poeple with PR don't need to send money into Thailand with specific documentation aligned to paying for a condo / in other words money already here, money from local salary can be used to pay for the condo.

However nobody seems to be able to quote any official source which says - for people with PR, no need to send money from abroad.

Last week I spoke to three senior managers of Thai banks, in all cases they manage housing finance areas of their banks. All three are adamant that there is no special rule for foreigners with PR. They all claim that foreigners, with PR, have to send the money in from abroad, with special documentation.

Can somebody please advise me on the following point:

If I transfer for example A$200,000 from Aust bank to Thai bank, with appropriate documentation, can I hold back part of the proceeds, or do I have to give the exact proceeds on this transfer to the seller?

Look forward to your advice.

Regards

[lopburi3]

I would advise reading the law as outlined at LINK

My reading is that the foreign currency transfer would not be required except when you have no residence status.

[alanw]

lopburi3,

Thanks for the link.

Regards

Alanw

[sabaijai]

I have PR. There are many previous posts to this board indicating that poeple with PR don't need to send money into Thailand with specific documentation aligned to paying for a condo / in other words money already here, money from local salary can be used to pay for the condo.

However nobody seems to be able to quote any official source which says - for people with PR, no need to send money from abroad.

Last week I spoke to three senior managers of Thai banks, in all cases they manage housing finance areas of their banks. All three are adamant that there is no special rule for foreigners with PR. They all claim that foreigners, with PR, have to send the money in from abroad, with special documentation.

Can somebody please advise me on the following point:

If I transfer for example A$200,000 from Aust bank to Thai bank, with appropriate documentation, can I hold back part of the proceeds, or do I have to give the exact proceeds on this transfer to the seller?

Look forward to your advice.

Regards

When I was in the process of buying my condo I'd already transferred the money to my Thai account, from overseas, to use for the purchase. Showing the bank the paper trail for this transfer wasn't enough for them. They said the Bank of Thailand required them to have on file a letter from my overseas bank specifically stating that the money had been transferred for the purpose of buying a condo.

I asked my overseas bank for such a letter and the reponse was 1) We don't write such letters as part of our services, and 2) Even if we did, we can't do it after the money has already been transferred.

I went back to the bank, which was anxious to close the deal (they were the sellers) and told them if they couldn't somehow fix this, then the deal was off. They called me the next day and said everything had been taken care of, and the deal was closed with no further problems.

I later found out that my Thai bank had checked with the Bank of Thailand, and the BOT waived the requirement, so they apparently have a margin of discretion on this.

On the issue of whether PR means you don't have to transfer money from overseas, it doesn't seem logical to me. The law says that only Thai citizens may purchase property, with the one exceptiong being condos, which foreigners can buy. Even with PR you're still a foreigner.

Edited August 2, 2004 by sabaijai

[lopburi3]

On the issue of whether PR means you don't have to transfer money from overseas, it doesn't seem logical to me. The law says that only Thai citizens may purchase property, with the one exceptiong being condos, which foreigners can buy. Even with PR you're still a foreigner.

What Thai law says that? The law restricts land ownership, not property AFAIK.

So are you saying a person living his life in Thailand should not be able to buy a condo with the money he earns here but any foreigner should be able to transfer money and buy? And receive special visa conditions to boot? I don't buy that! Although I would assume the condo would still have to meet the foreign ownership conditions.

[sabaijai]

By property I meant real estate, obviously, not property in the more generic sense.

I don't recall where I read the written law, not sure whether it was at the Land Dept or elsewhere, sorry the memory is going. I checked into it when I decided I wanted to make an offer on the condo I eventually bought two years ago.

Of course the condo exception will apply only up to 49% of the units/square meters (not sure which, can't remember) in a given condo project.

I realise that thaivisa.com's Resident Permit page claims that those with PR can buy condos without transferring money from overseas. That may very well be true, but as far as I recall that aspect wasn't mentioned in the regulations I read. Seemed to me the law applied to all foreigners. I freely admit I could be wrong.

At any rate what I was trying to say is that you might try pushing the seller a bit to see if they can get the BOT to issue a waiver on the requirement to transfer funds from overseas.

Even if there is an exception for PR, if your bank isn't aware of it you may not be able to convince them. If that's the case, then I still recommend trying to fix things the way I did.

One other thing, when I asked my bank about financing I was told flat out that they did not offer house or condo financing for foreigners. Maybe they were just lazy but you would think they would jump at the chance to earn the interest. [Aside: I've found it impossible to get a Thai credit card for the same reason, despite a perfect 40-year payment record with several overseas credit cards with fairly high credit limits. I have a non-B and work permit, no PR. Just as happy now not to have a Thai credit card, as my Thai friends say the bills tend to come late and contain errors.]