Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Malaysia My Second Home Program. I don't usually do videos directly on Malaysian Immigration or Vietnamese Immigration, Cambodian Immigration, Laos Immigration, Myanmar Immigration for that matter but every now and again I do make videos on them because they have a tangential impact. The Expat Community in Southeast Asia in my opinion is looking at the region as a whole and I do think that a lot of folks try to compare different jurisdictions to ascertain whether or not a place is a good fit for them to become an expat. We are talking about this oftentimes in a retiree context. 

Now, understand we are here in Thailand. We have a very Thailand centric view of these things. We don't handle any Malaysian Immigration or anything but I did think this was interesting especially in light of the fact I recently made a video about how, at least in my opinion, as much complaining as one could do about; Retirees especially have not been thrilled in many cases with certain requirements that have been added on to Retirement Visas in the past few years most notably the end of the Income Affidavit that could be gotten from certain foreign Embassies here in Thailand as well as the addition of certain insurance requirements associated with maintaining Retirement Visas in Thailand. I get that; that folks had their frustrations associated with that but comparing to other places in the region I think Thailand is actually very welcoming, very accommodating of retirees when you look at it relative to other jurisdictions. I am not saying that is a one-size-fits all analysis but overall I do think it is pretty well correct. In a recent article from the Star, that is thestar.com.my, the article is titled: Nine Conditions for New MM2H applications. Quoting directly: "Nine new conditions have been introduced to the updated Malaysia My Second Home (MM2H Programme) which will accept fresh applications starting October. Quoting further: "Applicants must have an offshore income of at least RM 40,000 a month, a fourfold increase from the RM 10,000 monthly previously- as the Government is targeting high income earners for MM2H. Quoting further: "Home Ministry Secretary Datuk Wan Ahmad Dahlan Abdul Aziz said participants must also have a fixed deposit with a minimum of RM 1 million although a withdrawal of up to 50% will be allowed on purchasing properties or spending on services or their children's education. Prior to this, participants were required to have a fixed deposit of at least 150,000 if they were above the age of 50 or 300,000 if they were younger." Quoting further: "The validity of the MM2H pass including extensions thereafter is now 5 years instead of 10." 

So they have made changes. They have clearly upped a lot of the financial requirements. We have speculated on this channel, posed the question whether Thailand may do something similar. I am of the opinion that probably not. I think they will probably just leave things as they are because quite frankly at this time, attracting and frankly keeping long-term expats especially retirees I think it already is a priority, but I think it is going to be increasingly a priority as the economic situation around the world and even here in Thailand becomes let's say more tenuous. Now Malaysia has clearly come out and said they are going to change this Malaysia My Second Home Program. Does this have ramifications directly for Thailand? I don't know but it may ultimately cause some folks to go ahead and choose Thailand over Malaysia in the future but we can't really know that right now so we will keep folks updated on this channel as the situation progresses.