Child Owning Land

[mpdkorat]

Can my 1 year old Thai/English son own land. If not what age can land be registered in his name.

[GuestHouse]

The child would need a manager of the land to act on his/her behalf until the child becomes 21(maybe 18?).

The manager would be a the Thai mother/father unless the Thai mother or father had died and left the land to the child in a Will that stipulates who is to manage to land on behalf of the child.

This may be a foreigner, but in the only case I personally know of that a foreigner did act as land manager for his Thai child the other members of the family, the child's aunts and uncles, challenged the Will in court. The foreign father did maintain management of his son's land but he told me it was a close run thing and had been dependent on the Will being correctly drafted.

This route is complicated more where the Thai wife has a child from a past marriage/relationship, a circumstance relatively common in Thai/Farang marriages, since the other child would be entitled to claim a share and perhaps duress in the writing of the Will.

You would be better to have a Lease or Usufruct on the land.

[mpdkorat]

The child would need a manager of the land to act on his/her behalf until the child becomes 21(maybe 18?).

The manager would be a the Thai mother/father unless the Thai mother or father had died and left the land to the child in a Will that stipulates who is to manage to land on behalf of the child.

This may be a foreigner, but in the only case I personally know of that a foreigner did act as land manager for his Thai child the other members of the family, the child's aunts and uncles, challenged the Will in court. The foreign father did maintain management of his son's land but he told me it was a close run thing and had been dependent on the Will being correctly drafted.

This route is complicated more where the Thai wife has a child from a past marriage/relationship, a circumstance relatively common in Thai/Farang marriages, since the other child would be entitled to claim a share and perhaps duress in the writing of the Will.

You would be better to have a Lease or Usufruct on the land.

Thanks for the quick reply. So I take it there is no age restriction in registering the land in the childs name. And yes my wife does have a child from a previous relationship.

[buriramboy]

i can speak from personal experience here, my daughter( half thai/half farang) who is 3 has 20 rai of land in her name in Buri-ram, only hassle was it took all day in the land office signing papers, i actually had to sign about 20 bits of paper myself, all in Thai so idea what i was signing, but the woman in the land office did say that the land can not be sold and no money can be borrowed on it until my daughter is 20.

[mpdkorat]

i can speak from personal experience here, my daughter( half thai/half farang) who is 3 has 20 rai of land in her name in Buri-ram, only hassle was it took all day in the land office signing papers, i actually had to sign about 20 bits of paper myself, all in Thai so idea what i was signing, but the woman in the land office did say that the land can not be sold and no money can be borrowed on it until my daughter is 20.

Thanks for that. This is what I was led to believe, like guesthouse has already mentioned my wife has an elder child which my lead to complications in the future. I want the ownership to be in my sons name, therefore I want to get it right first time.

[buriramboy]

my wife has no previous children, so i don't know about that, but just talking to the wife apparantly all the papers i signed were basically saying that my wife and i are jointly responsible for the land until my daughter is 20 then she can do what she wants with it.

[mpdkorat]

my wife has no previous children, so i don't know about that, but just talking to the wife apparantly all the papers i signed were basically saying that my wife and i are jointly responsible for the land until my daughter is 20 then she can do what she wants with it.

Re reading what guesthouse wrote, in his example there seemed to be a will involved. If the land was purchased in the name of a specific child, not quite sure how any other child could have claim on it. Of course I'm no lawyer or land expert, thats why I'm here.

Edited November 9, 2006 by mpdkorat

[Old Man River]

i can speak from personal experience here, my daughter( half thai/half farang) who is 3 has 20 rai of land in her name in Buri-ram, only hassle was it took all day in the land office signing papers, i actually had to sign about 20 bits of paper myself, all in Thai so idea what i was signing, but the woman in the land office did say that the land can not be sold and no money can be borrowed on it until my daughter is 20.

Did you put a lease on the property before gifting the property to your child? (assuming it is where you live). Also, what taxes were involved? We are in the middle of estate planning in Thailand, and I am still not sure whether to gift the property to our child now, or put it in the will and go through the inheritance route.

Thanks,

[Nawtilus]

A lawyer also told me, when I enquired about this, that you can do it at any age but if anything changes and you want to do something wiith the land, lease it, sell it...whatever...anything at all, you have to get permission from the court for it.

This then involves time, cost and cosiderable effort to get something done or changed.

[Old Man River]

A lawyer also told me, when I enquired about this, that you can do it at any age but if anything changes and you want to do something wiith the land, lease it, sell it...whatever...anything at all, you have to get permission from the court for it.

This then involves time, cost and cosiderable effort to get something done or changed.

Thanks for the response. It sounds like the inheritance route makes the most sense.

[buriramboy]

no lease on the property, it is 100% in daughters name and i have the che-note(don't know how to spell) here with me, i don't live there it used to be a paddy field but now started to grow rubber trees on the land, if i remember correctly i think i paid 3.5% of what they valued the land at about 15,000 baht at the land office for the land to be transferred into daughters name.

[mpdkorat]

no lease on the property, it is 100% in daughters name and i have the che-note(don't know how to spell) here with me, i don't live there it used to be a paddy field but now started to grow rubber trees on the land, if i remember correctly i think i paid 3.5% of what they valued the land at about 15,000 baht at the land office for the land to be transferred into daughters name.

I'm getting a little confused. Could not the land be purchased in the name of the child in the first place, rather than a parent buying it and the transferring into the childs name.

[buriramboy]

the land was originally the mother-in-laws (daughters grandmother) and i believe transfer costs are normally 5% but because it is one family member to another the fee was 3.5%.

[mpdkorat]

the land was originally the mother-in-laws (daughters grandmother) and i believe transfer costs are normally 5% but because it is one family member to another the fee was 3.5%.

Ok I'm with you now.

[think_too_mut]

Instead of buying any land (or attempting to and going through Thai beurocracy) I opened an account in my child's name with an Oz bank. "Happy Dragon" they call it. No fees, 6.8% interest.

When she is 18, the money would be about 3 mil baht, in her name.

Every quarter she gets her bank statement to her Thai address although she has no idea what it is.

The money is still mine over next 15 years, not that I plan to do anything with it, but nice to know I can If a need be. And I don't have to be in Thailand and depend on anyone. Neither does she has to care about a nuclear reactor or a pig farm being built next to her property.

Edited November 10, 2006 by think_too_mut

[JacknDanny]

Instead of buying any land (or attempting to and going through Thai beurocracy) I opened an account in my child's name with an Oz bank. "Happy Dragon" they call it. No fees, 6.8% interest.

When she is 18, the money would be about 3 mil baht, in her name.

Every quarter she gets her bank statement to her Thai address although she has no idea what it is.

The money is still mine over next 15 years, not that I plan to do anything with it, but nice to know I can If a need be. And I don't have to be in Thailand and depend on anyone. Neither does she has to care about a nuclear reactor or a pig farm being built next to her property.

Do you have to be Australian to open this account.

I am English, if I went on holiday to OZ could I open an account like this for my son?

Are you able to transfer money INTO the account on a monthly basis

[think_too_mut]

Instead of buying any land (or attempting to and going through Thai beurocracy) I opened an account in my child's name with an Oz bank. "Happy Dragon" they call it. No fees, 6.8% interest.

When she is 18, the money would be about 3 mil baht, in her name.

Every quarter she gets her bank statement to her Thai address although she has no idea what it is.

The money is still mine over next 15 years, not that I plan to do anything with it, but nice to know I can If a need be. And I don't have to be in Thailand and depend on anyone. Neither does she has to care about a nuclear reactor or a pig farm being built next to her property.

Do you have to be Australian to open this account.

I am English, if I went on holiday to OZ could I open an account like this for my son?

Are you able to transfer money INTO the account on a monthly basis

Sorry, I am not sure. They did ask for my passport copy and baby's birth certificate.

Also, for taxation they asked for my working visa in Japan.

see here:

http://www.stgeorge.com.au/accounts/transa...sp?orc=personal

(Good that you asked, I just noticed it's for kids up to 13 years of age. Will have to do something else after that).

On the website they say you visit their branch together with the kid but I did not even go to the country - all over mail (they wanted real paper, no fax, although initially fax was ok as a placeholder but real paper (that they returned back to me) was required).

If you are allowed to open it, then:

The account is "in/out into another account" only. No ATM cards, cheques, passbooks - nothing on it. To withdraw the money you need to drag it first to another account that has all the features. Over the net, 24x7.

To put money in, any time (though sizeable amounts would raise the flag).

Some NZ bank is advertising 7.8%, that must be open to anyone. HSBC does that too, you have to give them the link to the account where the money is and they do the rest.