Am looking to stay at least 6 months in Chiang Mai ... from my research i understand that I will need either Retirement Visa or Education Visa ... both of which, from my understanding, are obtained AFTER arriving on a tourist visa (30 days). 

 

I have many questions unanswered, but the first one is this: Seeing you cannot enter the country without a return airfare .... How does one buy a return ticket without yet knowing what the return date will be???

 

Be gentle .. i can be a bit slow on the  uptake :D

 

Thanks

 

Rfah

A tourist visa from an embassy or consulate allows a 60 day entry that can be extended for 30 days at an immigration office.

The 30 days you wrote about is a visa exempt entry not a tourist visa. The 30 day entry can be extended for 30 days at a immigration office.

It seems that a multiple entry tourist visa (aka METV) would be a good option for you. A METV would allow unlimited 60 day entries for 6 months from the date of issue. You can get almost 9 months of total stay from the visa  by getting a new 60 day entry just before the visa expires and then a 30 day extension of that entry.

A retirement visa or ED visa would be issued by an embassy or consulate not at immigration here.

You could apply for a one year extension of stay based upon retirement at a immigration office. You would need 800k baht in a Thai bank or proof of 65k baht income or a combination of the 2 totaling 800k baht.

To get a single entry non-ed visa and then 90 day extensions at immigration you would need to enroll in a school to get the required to documents to apply for them.

Thanks joe, that was a good clear explanation.