Thai Companies

[lukamar]

I read the posts on starting a business and now i'm more confused than before. A condition that is not new to me.. Maybe my situation is a bit different so i'll lay out some of it.

I'm Canadian married to a Thai. We plan on moving back to Thailand in about 5 years. I qualify for a 1 year visa so staying in thailand is not a big problem and neither is earning a living as i have the required income.

We would like to build a small resort in the North. When I say small I'm talking about 4 to 8 rental units and a restaurant. I have 35 years in the Hospitality Food and Beverage industry as a chef and manager. Here lies our delema.

We have found some land that is suitable for this and we can buy the land in my wifes name, with her money of course

Now can we form a company and lease "her" land and have the company build the buildings in the feauture?

Or in the feauture can the company buy the land and build the buildings.

Or ????? Options ????

We would like to buy the land and complete construction before we move back.

What would be the work permit requitement if I was to work in a management position otr as the chef at the resort? I have no idea of the number of employees that may work there but there would be none until we move back. Unless we have a caretaker.

I'd appreciate any input..

Thanks

[narit]

Now can we form a company and lease "her" land and have the company build the buildings in the feauture?

Yes you can. The maximum lease is 30 years. Any lease of more than 3 years must be register with land dept's local offices, otherwise it's not bidding only 3 years. It's kind tax you need to pay for registering.

If the company has 50.01 owned by your Thai wife, and 49.99 by you a foriegner, your company legally can buy land. However, practically if your company is owned by a foriegner more than 25%, the land registrar will be more than vigilant to check whether the actual money come from Thais or not. I am not too sure about the practicality of this matter.

Even you have your wife owns majority of share say 50.01 % but in the reality if you actually put money on the company, you can structure the articles of association to somewhat give you roughl the percent of return that maches your percentage of investment. Say in fact you put 80% of capital. Your wife can own 49.99% you can have 80% of return.

You need a work permit. It depends on the qualification of company you have . The capital of your company. Work permit is more compliated than I know. And I am not immigration lawyer, you may have to talk with them on this regards. If you need lawyer contact, I have some contact but I don't have precise answer for you on this. My gut feeling is the more capital you invest, the easier you can get work permit. I think it's just the matter of money. I have been researching the work permit by myself as I have a foriegn partner who plans to marry. According to my latest search, he cost the immigration lawyer asks can range from 15,000 to 35,000 Baht. The more work they do they cheaper they charge us. Remember you need to renew work permit every year. This cost runs perpetually. And Permanent Resident of Thailand still needs work permit.