Greetings,

 

I'm looking for a bit of guidance here. We've recently moved to Chiang Mai and plan to stick around for a few years. My wife has Thai citizenship, but has spent her adult life in the US. She has excellent credit in the US, which I've read means nothing here in Thailand.

 

Currently, my wife has no bank accounts or credit history in Thailand. We plan to open a bank account in the immediate future. Someday in the not-so-distant future, we'd like to qualify for a car and/or home loan. Does this work much the same way in Thailand as it might in the US? Should she get a credit card and start using it (responsibly, of course) to establish a credit history? 

 

Basically, I'm just trying to figure out how we can get the balling rolling with her credit history, so we're not starting from scratch when we decide we'd like a car loan or home loan.

 

I'd like to clarify that I'm asking about how SHE (a Thai) can best establish credit, not me. 

 

Thanks.

 

-CTD

Thai financial institutions can't take any credit data from overseas into account. That would be the same for US banks. You would probably get a surprised look, if you asked them to take Thai credit data into account.

 

In most cases, you need a job and several months' pay slips to apply for a credit card in Thailand.  Rarely will they approve one without that.  The credit limit will be some multiple of your monthly salary.  The same is largely true for housing and consumer loans, although some super high interest short term loans can be obtained with collateral, such as a car.  The government Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives will lend money purely on the collateral of title deeds to agricultural lands without any evidence of income and they are more than happy to repossess farmers' land when they can't service the debt. 

 

Credit history has not been available for very long in Thailand - only about 15 years or so and a positive credit history is unlikely to help you obtain a credit card or a loan, if you don't have evidence of income or collateral.  However, a bad credit history could destroy your chances.

Thanks for taking the time to respond. This is helpful. I appreciate it.