Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing issues pertaining to yet again these foreigners here in Thailand who chime in on legal issues where they have no clue what they're talking about, okay. 

Now for those who would say, "well isn’t that hypocritical? you are a foreigner", I'm not a foreigner anymore. I naturalized to Thai, but also, I actually have qualifications with regard to, I don't know, a Doctorate in Law and a background in Comparative Law. I have been a Professor of Law at Bangkok University, specifically Mass Media Law; I do have some background in this kind of stuff. I'm not just completely talking from nothing, okay. Now as I've discussed in other videos, I am not a Thai Attorney; I've never claimed to be a Thai Attorney. Again, I hold a Juris Doctorate; I am an American Attorney; I am a Thai national. Now, what's the difference between me and some foreign national in Thailand. One, I am Thai. As I've discussed in other videos at length, there are restricted occupations in Thailand. Legal Services is one of those restricted occupations, as is “real estate agents”. I've discussed this at length. The Department of Employment has this up on their website; I have put links up before. I'll probably put a link in the description below; you can go read it for yourself. Again, foreigners are not supposed to be involved in anything pertaining to land or land development in Thailand, and also, legal profession or the legal services are explicitly restricted. 

Yet, I got a recent email from a viewer. "This is a relevant video on YouTube" - they sent me this link, I'll probably go ahead and put this in the description below so that, I don't really want to promote these folks because they are just spewing nonsense and one of the reasons I do this is I do this is I view this as like a civic duty. Here are these people out here in direct contravention of Thai Law, talking about stuff that frankly they have no idea about - as we'll get into here in a moment - this is another reason I have a problem with this is because this person is spouting nonsense, and quoting from this email: "It starts with the interview somewhere at minute 11 and/or 12 for the "solution loophole". And then this person goes on to sort of cast aspersions at this person. But long story short, my first question, the person in this video, which is also in the thumbnail here, is this person Thai? If they are not Thai, what are you doing man? That's the reason for the thumbnail from the film Money Ball;  there is this great scene in Money Ball where they are talking about trying to replace players on a baseball team - they don't really have a lot of money - and basically these guys are talking along, and Brad Pitt's listening, he says, "look, you're talking nonsense”. He basically says, "is there another first baseman like Giambi?" they are talking about Jason Giambi and they basically say, "no", and he says, "if there was, could we afford him?" and they said, "well no" and he said, "well what the F are you talking about man?" Well here's me. If you're a foreign national, what are you doing out on YouTube putting yourself out there, completely exposing yourself to all kinds of possible legal consequences for engaging in this activity? Again, this is not unknown in Thailand. Foreign nationals are not able, legally, to be involved in legal services, to be involved in real estate, let alone to be commenting the way that they are in this video, and going through there, this person starts talking about, "oh there was always a loophole that allowed foreign nationals to own land through companies." No there wasn't. There was never a loophole; there was colour of law mechanisms that were utilized at a time when frankly the bureaucracy in Thailand did not have the capability of cross-referencing certain aspects of corporate documentation, along with real estate documentation, along with other possible appended corporate documentation, i.e. things like a secondary holding company, and the system couldn't necessarily see that there was an issue underlying all of the sort of for lack of a better word, sort of documentary chicanery for lack of a better term, but again I have discussed this at length. I remember some 15 years ago reading about it in the Bangkok Post that the Land Department was appointing a new investigator, an inspector, inside the Land Department who was tasked with purely going out and finding folks that were utilizing companies and various other structures for foreigners to own land and to do everything in their power to strip that land. And here's this person talking about it like, "oh this was an acceptable loophole". No it never was. People just got away with it. There's an important distinction there. 

Now, as I have discussed in other videos, in videos I've talked about like the shop house model, there are narrow sets of circumstances where foreigners could have an interest in a corporation that owns property. There are certain fact patterns that I can think of in my head where that may be appropriate and lawmakers and policy makers here in Thailand might say, "yeah, yeah, that's okay." But it has never been this broad loophole that just because you put a piece of property in a company, you can therefore own it. That has always been viewed by Thai Authorities as basically chicanery, and an attempt to circumvent Thai Law regarding restriction of land ownership for foreigners; that's always been there. And then this person goes on to say, "and they have passed a “new law” that's bringing online all this new enforcement". What are you talking about? No, they're not. They are just enforcing the laws that are already on the books. 

This is a perfect example of why the foreign community needs to be constantly warned about these people that have no qualification whatsoever to be talking about land ownership, corporate structures, anything, because these people clearly don't know what they're talking about. I can't believe somebody would go out on YouTube and just completely talk nonsense to this level. It was never a loophole; they haven't passed a new law. They are just enforcing the laws that are already on the books; that's what's going on here. And they now have the AI tools to more effectively and efficiently do that. And if you don't know the difference, you shouldn't be going anywhere near people's legal affairs, especially as it pertains to real estate, in this jurisdiction or quite frankly much of any other.  

Again, this is my big problem with unqualified, for lack of a better term, fake lawyers, unqualified foreigners, folks that are in Thailand - again real estate agents - foreigners can't engage in that business. It's clear. It's in the Department of Employment's restricted occupations; it's all in English. Again, I'll put it in the description below the link to that, but agency - acting as any kind of agent in Thailand is presumptively prescribed -unless there is a specific exception to allow some sort of agency, and there are a few for a few different things, but for the most part, No. And again, this stuff is really troubling because the public can be led into a bad situation by bad actors in Thailand and that is what I am most concerned about.