I was recently told by a Thai Banker aquaintance of mine that the reason Thailand has so many new housing starts is because the Thai people(in general) do not like to live in a previously owned house/condo etc., so this makes the "used" housing market a very difficult one and the new dwellings a much better performer; Anyone here heard of this? I asked a long time Thai (Thai Chinese) aquaintance about this and he indeed confirmed this to be the case. Maybe this is one reason there are so many rentals here in the LOS to be had and in many cases at a very affordable price.

This has been my experience and I get the impression the only buyers for used units are us farangs. I am moving to a new condo soon and will be selling my old condo which is completely modernised but there is no interest in it from Thais. I prefer buying used as it generally comes with all the fittings and furniture. When I vacate mine it will be fully equipped for someone to move in without having to buy a single piece of furniture.

I think your are correct and I agree, I also have more interest in a fitted out home albeit a new home is nice but me thinks building/buying a new home is too much effort and aggrivation here in the LOS to build/buy and rig out. I was told by a friend of mine that the house he has been renting for the past six years has been on the market for sale since before he rented the house. He was told by his landlord there has been no interested partys at all, foreign or local; he said the house is first class and in a great location(Chiang Mai), owner is asking 3.3 MB fully furnished, 85 Talang Wah. I looked at it but it was just not for me, too big and not enough land, nice house though.

Yep, I've lived here just under fifteen years and I can also confirm that your impression is absolutely correct. There is also another factor at work which kills the sales of individually owned residenial property stone dead, however, and it is even more important than the Thai preferences you described.

You will have very little success selling residential property anywhere in the world without an effective agent who can expose the property to whatever the market may be, and Thai agencies are overtly hostile to selling property for individuals. All the large agencies work to get exclusive deals with big developers to market newly developed property, and rather than seeing the sale of properties currently owned by individuals as helping to seed the market for these new properties by encouraging people to move up to a higher priced place, Thai agents see your property as competitive with the new property they are trying to sell and do everyrthing they can to prevent its sale.

Yeah, I know how stupid that is, but Thais have never been noted for being commercially astute, have they?