Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are posing the question will funds transferred into Thailand pertaining to Retirement Visas, 'will they be taxed?' is the big question. For those who are unaware, yes, generally speaking most folks opt to utilize basically a lump sum amount in a given Thai Bank Account in order to meet the requirement, specifically the financial requirement associated with not only initial issuance of a Retirement Visa but also subsequent extension and renewal of Thai Retirement Visa status. For those who are unaware, it is an 800,000 Baht minimum balance that has to be maintained in a Thai Bank Account if you are using a lump sum methodology of maintaining oneself in retiree status here in the Kingdom. 

The question posed is "will the money be taxed?" I have got to tell you, there is a whole lot of nonsense just out there on the internet floating around right now. I have got to say YouTube seems to be especially acutely full of a great deal of just misnomers floating around and the biggest misnomer is that there is any kind of catch-all analysis when it comes to this. Now to one degree or another, yes there is some analysis that for example depending on your nationality, some kind of analysis regarding a possible Double Tax Agreement between Thailand and another country may pop up, but I have been seeing a lot of stuff, some of it from folks that I think were trying to operate in good faith but in some cases I think there is sort of a YouTuber side of this where a YouTuber is trying to interview someone who has some specialized knowledge and then they are trying to make that into a one-size-fits-all kind of scenario I guess. I mean they are trying to use this very specialized knowledge that they are gleaning off of a professional to try and apply it broadly. At the end of the day, that is not how you should be looking at these things. Long story short, I have talked about this in other videos. If you are truly worried about this, it is really a good idea to contact a legal professional and get some insight and guidance and the reason for that is you will probably put your mind completely at ease. A lot of folks that I talk to on these topics and we have the Thai Attorneys here in the office as well as the Thai accountants who deal with the Thai side; I am an American Attorney, I deal with the American side of the tax thing; I am a member of the Tax Court and I advise quite frequently on matters pertaining to the interaction between American Tax Law and Thai Tax Law in conjunction with my colleagues here in the office. In the vast majority of cases involving folks who think they are going to have some huge tax put on them, in fact I saw somebody on YouTube who was saying I had said this that 'oh you are going to be stuck with 35% on all transfers brought in'. I have never said that. We have discussed the possibility that certain funds transferred into Thailand could become subject to tax depending on the circumstances in the underlying case but as I have also said, the vast majority of people who are worried about this, are probably not going to be affected at all. 

So the thing to take away from this video is one, it is not at all a presumption that you are going to be hit with some over the top tax just for bringing money in to support your own Retirement Visa. That is not something that you should presume will necessarily be the case. Are there certain instances where perhaps there could be a tax applied to somebody who brings in money to Thailand? Yes there are scenarios. The vast majority of retirees though are probably not going to have to worry about this for a variety of different reasons but again each case is different so I'm not going to stand here and make a video and say 'oh well you don't have to worry about taxes at all'. At the same time I'm not going to make a video that just says 'everybody is going to be taxed out of their minds!' That is silly as well, okay?

At the end of the day I have talked about this before, probably 80% of retirees here in Thailand aren't even going to notice this occurred. There may be 20% who do have or do feel an impact on this but again every case is different. It is not a wise presumption to go ahead and assume that either would apply. What you need to do is get narrowly tailored, very specified advice in your circumstances if you are truly worried about tax liability here in the Kingdom of Thailand.