Property in Thailand — we find it, check it and register it in your name

Yes. A condominium unit is registered to a foreigner as freehold — indefinitely, with an entry at the Land Department. There is one limit: foreigners may hold up to 49% of the saleable floor area of a building, so the quota is checked building by building. The money has to arrive from abroad in foreign currency — the bank then issues the FET form, and without it there is no registration. Citizenship itself changes nothing: the rules are the same for Russian, Kazakh and any other passport.

A foreigner cannot own land — this is not a loophole to be worked around, it is Thai law. Three structures actually work: a registered 30-year lease of the land with a renewal option (the house itself can still be in your name), a Thai company, or Sap-Ing-Sith — the right introduced in 2019, which is registrable, sellable, mortgageable and inheritable. What is available in a particular village depends on the developer: we match the structure to the specific house and explain how each one plays out when you resell.

Right now the base has listings from ฿2M — studios and one-bedroom units in completed second-line developments. The median for studios is around 75,000 ฿/m², for one-bedroom apartments 88,000 ฿/m². Cheaper usually means further from the sea: in Naklua and East Pattaya a square metre costs half of what it does in Wongamat.

On new developments it is the norm: developers give interest-free instalments until completion — usually 20–30% down and the rest in equal payments. On completed properties the seller sometimes offers instalments, less often and over a shorter term. We tell you upfront which developments have genuinely good instalment terms and where it is just marketing.

It depends on your goal. A developer gives you instalments, a brand-new building and a warranty, but you move in a year or two later and the price includes the sales team’s commission. Resale gives you room to negotiate, furniture already in place and the chance to see exactly what you are buying. Across 573 developments in our data the gap between the developer price and actual deals in the same building runs anywhere from 10% to 30% — the calculator above shows it for your development.

Condominium fees are charged per square metre; for villas the village charges a flat fee. Add the tax on resale and the one-off fees at registration. We give you a one-year cost-of-ownership estimate before the deal — so that an “affordable” property does not turn out to be expensive to keep.