Is Thailand Value for money

[fanciman]

Any suggestions?

Where are their offices?

If you have some nice ideas for reasonably priced, in fact cheap, apartments for sale, that would be very handy too.

[ElephantRealEstate]

Any suggestions?

Where are their offices?

If you have some nice ideas for reasonably priced, in fact cheap, apartments for sale, that would be very handy too.

Check us out. www.elephantrealestate.com

[thaitot]

I guess this about sums it up.

Unfortunately maybe 1 in Chiang Mai.

You said the word cheap.

Not enough blood to suck.

[Gravelrash]

Any suggestions?

Where are their offices?

If you have some nice ideas for reasonably priced, in fact cheap, apartments for sale, that would be very handy too.

If you want to buy cheap at say THB300,000 then the blood sucking agent should have a comission of a whopping THB9,000 (ie 3%). Who needs those parasites getting rich like that? Cheap will of course mean cheap as to location, size, quality or condition of building, lack of facilities etc. Expect to get what you pay for.

The below work on commission and not jacking the price up, no BMWs in the carpark:

Don'y know if they have what you want though.

www.chiangmaicondo.net

www.firstnationalthailand.com

[lotus eater]

May I widen this query by asking for recommendations of agents for house rentals?

[ProThaiExpat]

Keep in mind that real estate agents in Thailand are not licensed and represent the sellers or owners. They rarely share commissions among themselves, as yet, so getting them to show you available units that are not listed with them is rare.

The industry is changing somewhat so you may hear of a buyer's or renter's agent but I doubt it.

[lotus eater]

Estate agents in England are also unlicensed and without professional body's qualification. They also supposedly represent the seller or landlord - the latter pays their fees. My experience however is - having been their client on both sides that in practice they will push both seller/landlord and buyer/tenant equally hard and with equally tall stories towards a lower price in order to close the deal asap. The quicker deal with consequent minimizing of expenses is for the agent well worth the reduced percentage fee.

In Thailand I gather that the agent gets the equivalent of a month's rent as compensation for a rental. Does he also tend to press the landlord to agree a lower/realistic rent to get the deal done quickly? In other words is the potential tenant really losing that much in dealing through the agent instead of looking on his own?

[engineer]

" If you want to buy cheap at say THB300,000 then the blood sucking agent should have a comission of a whopping THB9,000 (ie 3%). Who needs those parasites getting rich like that? "

I know a few people who work in real estate and they would tell you that on adverage you they sell a house or a condo every 2 / 3 weeks. Personally I do not think that $ 300.00 is alot of money to pay someone if they find the perfect place for you. They do alot of the leg work and a good agency should be able to show you many options according to your requirements. If you are new to the city and do not know the neighborhoods or the laws regarding ownership of property by foreigners then these people can certainly help you. Check and see who is paying the commission, someone always does and if the seller is motivated he will be happy to pay it. Be careful, a motivated seller is also a desperate seller, perhaps his place has not sole in a year and there is a reason. Look for places that are fresh to the market and if you do end up paying a " whopping " $ 300.00 or 9.000 THB to someone who has found you a great deal, a great home and saved you time then it is a small price to pay I think. At $ 300.00 a pop and 2 sales a month, I reckon the bloodsucking agent would be rich by 2050.

Remember when you walk in the front door of a real estate agency that a fee is charged no matter what country you live in. They dont work for free but I am sure its possible to haggle down the fee. This is Thailand remember.

Look for an agency that is a member of the Thai Real Estate Association and the Thai Real Estate Brokers Association.

Make sure you are comfortable with your agent and that their level of english is good enough so that your questions are understood and so are their answers.

I was lucky when I moved here, I found a great guy but he has since closed shop. Guess the $ 200.00 that he made off me was enough for him to retire on in luxury somewhere.

Good Luck

[ProThaiExpat]

lotuseater: As a retired real estate broker, among other things, who was the broker of record for a firm with 1300 agents in the U.S., I find it strange, although it seems to work in England and Australia, that agents only represent sellers or owners. Yes, recently, Australia has started advertising buyers agents, but not many.

My experience in Thailand and Australia has been such that I find it difficult to survey all the properties on offer at any one time, without exhaustive effort. In the U.S., each agency has every estate on offer in the entire city on their computers and agents of that firm are more than happy to show you any estate, regardless of who has the property listed as the rules are that the seller/owner paid selling comision is split between the two agents, if a non-listing agent sells the property.

In fact, if an agent takes acts in a dual capacity, ie. representing the seller and the buyer on the same property, he must obtain their consent for the dual agency, as there is an inherent conflict of interest if a real estate agent represents both the seller and the buyer. In our firm, we required the office broker/manager to step in and represent the "other" party, to avoid the conflict.

In looking at property in Australia where the agents represent only the seller, as in Thailand, you have to do a lot of footwork and ad review to be able to get a good feel for what is available and relative values. In the American system, sitting down in the agents office and scrolling through the listing data base, gives you a pretty good idea of all the properties on offer and which ones are worth your effort to see personally.

I did speak to some of the younger agents in some of the firms in Australia and they having no listings of their own, were willing to help prospective buyers, but needless to say, their agency pressured them to sell that agency's listings.

There must be a good reason why the UK and Australia haven't gone to a multiple listing service approach to selling real estate so prevalent in the U.S.,but I don't know what it would be. Anyone have any idea why not?

[thaitot]

Your points are well taken. A prospective buyer would like to look at available properties in order to get an idea of market value for local real estate.

A person in Thailand with a web site will show you the properties they have available these are properties they will receive commission on should they sell or rent.

This is called business and survival in Thailand.

Now in order to get a real perspective on the market one might need to visit 10 different web site advertisers to complete this task.

Doing this type of property searching wastes the time of the web site advertisers as only one will get the sale. And makes the Farang look like a person who is trying to short change the web site advertiser.

There is no malice intended this is just traditionally how Farangs buy property.

The web site advertiser loses and the perspective buyer loses.

The blood sucking thing I used to draw out a certain undesirable web site advertiser and it worked.

If you profile a person as being cheap at the onset and let the sale pass you get what you deserve.

I would fire an agent that profiled a customer and did not work the sale to the end.

Maybe cheap to this person was 15 million. Now you just lost 450,000 a little better commission.

But allot of the web site advertisers are profiling and looking for the quick buck so in that case 9,000 baht is to much.

If someone has a good experience with a local organization or they start to understand how Farangs buy I think for them success will follow and please post it.

And lets not forget who is the customer.

Maybe these potential buyers are a little more sophisticated than the web site advertisers are accustomed to and they are intimidated.

Thats my guess.