Housing Developments (villages)

[dgarmaise]

The housing development (or village) that I live in took over ownership of, and responsibility for, the village common areas about four months ago. We adopted a set of regulations (bylaws), one of the requirements for registering our village at the land office. The regulations are about 30 pages long. We'd like to simplify them. If anyone has a short set of regulations for a village (village would be better than condo), I would like to hear about them. Another question: Does anyone know whether there is a list of regulations that must, by law, be included in the village regulations? Thanks.

[Bemused]

The answer to your question depends on whether you have purchased a lease or a condominium.

For condos the Thai government has legislated on how things should be run once the developer has transferred ownership. Look up a copy of Condominium Act No. 3 (1999/2542) and the July 2008 revision of the same Act for rules about the 'juristic person' managing the site. Any regulations for a condo need to be compliant with this legislation.

If you have purchased leasehold, the legislation in regards to post-transfer management is very weak. All I have found is a handful of clauses in the Civil and Commercial Code. In this instance the lease is the important document. Any secondary documentation, like a set of Regulations, has to be drafted on the basis of first principles in the lease itself. In relation to your question, if you have purchased a lease, then what you need to do is to read your lease inorder to determine what should and shouldn't be included.

This is a complicated issue. Unless you have some specific concern or objection you might not want to get heavily involved.

[dgarmaise]

Thanks, Bemused. My personal situation is that I purchased an existing company from another farang; the company owns a house in a village (housing development). I am on the Residents' Committee that was formed when the developer transferred ownership of the village common areas to the owners of the houses in the village. We "borrowed" a set of regulations from another village in order to complete the process of registering our village at the land office. Now, we would like to simplify the regulations. Hence, my request for a short and simple set of regulations, in use by a village somewhere, if that is possible. My other question related to whether there are certain provisions that have to be in the regulations according to law. I think this is what you addressed in your post, and I understand your comments to say that there is not much laid down in the law for villages (as opposed to condos).

[Bemused]

OK - so effectively you are a freeholder through your company.

Does the freehold title for the common areas now belong to your 'resident's association' or do the owners of the properties within the development each own a share of the freehold in their own right? The question is whose name is on the land title for the common areas?

Edited September 25, 2009 by Bemused

[dgarmaise]

The answer is the residents' association or, more accurately, the village, which was registered as a juristic entity at the land office.

OK - so effectively you are a freeholder through your company.

Does the freehold title for the common areas now belong to your 'resident's association' or do the owners of the properties within the development each own a share of the freehold in their own right? The question is whose name is on the land title for the common areas?

[Bemused]

There are lots of diffierent types of arrnagement people set up in Thailand. I am going to have guess at yours. Apologies if i have missed the mark.

The 'Village' is a limited Thai company. The set of rules and regulations you refer to is the Articles of Association of the company. The Articles of Association for another property development have been used for yours, saving the expense of getting a lawyer to think through and draft another set.

Articles of Association for a Thai company basically only need to set out the objectives of the company and how decisions are made, although the format needs to be correct if the Articles are to be accepted by the relevant registrar. The only reasons that you want to set out in great detail how the site will run and who gets charged for what is if purchasers have signed something stating that the rules to be followed are to be contained in the Articles of Association of the company managing the common areas. You might want to read any relevant sales contracts before redrafting your Articles of Association.

I reckon you would be better off leaving the detail on how the site is to be run out of the Articles of Association altogether. The board of directors for the company should decide on a set of policies dealing with the management of the site and publish a separate set of rules and regulations. Getting the management of the site right will be a matter of trial and error, and you want to have flexibility in adjusting rules and regulations as circumstance dictates.