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Permanent Residence in Thailand for Condo Buyers?

Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Permanent Residence here in Thailand as well as condo ownership or buying a Thai Condo.

In a recent article from Thai Visa but they appear to be translating it from Than Settakij, this article is titled: Calls to Get Foreigners Who Buy Condos Residency in Thailand. Quoting directly:  "The head of the Thai Condominium Association told the Thai financial media that she has recommended to the government to give foreigners migrant status if they purchase a condo of 10 million Baht or more. Meetings have taken place with developers since October 24th after requests were made to give foreigners 5-year visas for condos purchased of 5 million Baht", and I will get into that in another video. I want to get into this specific issue in this video.  Quoting further: "The Foreign Ministry has been pressed to make residents in the Kingdom easier to get like other countries especially neighboring states; Malaysia is often mentioned in this regard, notes Thai Visa", so that is their commentary. Quoting further: "but she advocated foreigners be given migrant status if they invest 10 million baht".

So a couple of things here. We are talking specifically about Thai Permanent Residence or Residency status here in the Kingdom of Thailand. This is not long-term Visa status, this is PR and this is quite a feat to get. It is somewhat of a cumbersome process to even become eligible under current rules. Yes, in the past there was and remains on the books this sort of option out there under certain circumstances to be able to obtain it via investment but the avenues that were once used for that, in fact there was a certain type of bond at one time that one could purchase in the amount of 10 million Baht that met the requisite legal requirements or I should say maybe regulatory requirements associated with seeking Permanent Residence. That era has gone. I definitely see the point with respect to trying to encourage Thai condo purchasing but a couple of things to note out here. First of all this is the head of the Thai Condominium Association, so again and I made videos on this, you have to consider the source. This isn't Immigration saying this. This isn't even TAT, Tourism Authority saying this. This is this the Thai Condominium Association so to be clear obviously they are going to want to encourage purchasing of Thai Condos. 

It should be noted also they mentioned the fact that the Foreign Ministry is being pressured and it remains to be seen and they don't really go into detail by exactly whom they are being pressured by; I am sure interest groups here in Thailand. That stated, Permanent Residency is something Thai Authorities take really seriously. We deal with it quite frequently here in the office and honestly I don't think it is particularly prudent to presume that they are going to be granting that anytime in the near future for investment purposes. Now they might and in a prior video we made, they were talking about Elite Visas attached to condo purchasing of 30 million Baht or more. Under those circumstances, Yeah I think it is probably safe to start looking at the possibility, maybe they might create a residence category for folks in that level of investment but I think the era of 10 million Baht being the threshold, I think that has come and gone.  Again, this is me editorializing a little bit here but just from my experience, I don't see Thai Immigration authorities looking to give out a benefit of that level of permanence for that level of investment. Again 30 million Baht, I could maybe see where policymakers might view that as being a sufficient threshold, but again all of this remains to be seen. None of it has been promulgated in terms of actual policy or law or regulation. As of now it remains to be seen if this will even happen. 

I am going to make another video contemporaneously with this one where we discuss the prospect of five year visas associated with condo ownership as I think that the practicalities of that are far more likely than the notion of Permanent Residence being attached to investment in a condominium here in the Kingdom of Thailand.