I did a quick search for some websites that exaplain the pros and cons for building your own place in Thailand or Indinesia. Has anyone had any luck? If you had the chance to self-build, where is the one place you would look? Phuket and Samui are all done - nothing much available. What about some other quieter, areas that see less tourists? I realise there's a lot of red tape with these projects, but they can all be overcome.... in time.

Thanks
Jak

koh chang??

For every one that's had some luck there are thousands who have returned home broke and broken. The easiest way to make a small fortune in Thailand (and Indonesia) is to start off with a large fortune. Rent - rent - rent is the way to go in my opinion. Even if you do manage to get some sort of fool-proof deal with lawyers where it's absolutely impossible for you to get screwed out of your investment, there are other factors to consider. You build or buy your dream home somewhere and next thing you know a local builds a karaoke pub next to you and your life becomes a nightmare because there's nothing you can do about it. So you put up with it and go mad or you try and sell and get out of there. Easier to rent and just move on when these things happen. And believe me they happen, I've known foreigners who have been driven out of their homes in Thailand due to noisy bars, whorehouses, funfairs, factories, panel-beating shops, spray-painting shops, chicken farms, animal slaughtering shops all set up next to their dream homes.

perfect advice....

can a foreigner own property outright in thailand??

To my understanding of the laws the answer is NO. Foreigners cannot own land in Thailand. Many foreigners buy property in a spouse's name, but then the marriage goes sour and they loose all. Others do deals with companies & lawyers where they have lifetime leases on the land/property, some of these agreements may be watertight, I'm not sure and I'm personally not prepared to take the chance.

You can own a condo. We always 'rent' out homes and offices but bought condos as investment in large established complexes, a condo is very very easy. Renting gives the ease to move if necessary.

Exactly...Buy a condo. That's why I spent nearly all of my days in Bangkok in August running around looking at condos. There are lots of them. Buy a freehold one...not a leasehold one and then it's really yours with no time-limit on ownership...although freehold ones cost more than leasehold ones. When I get back to Bangkok week after next, I'll spend a lot of my three-week vacation checking out buildings again. It depends on how much you plan to use the condo as to whether to rent or buy. If I decide to live there most of the year, in the future, then I would want to buy. I don't want to be bothered with renting and dealing with rent increases and landlords. Plus, when I'm not there...there are plenty of friends, here in the states, that I could rent it out to. They vacation in Bangkok. I'm not keen on renting the place out to strangers and coming back to possibly find it torn up or in bad repair. Plus, then there would be no flexibility of when I could travel there since a permanent renter would be occupying it.Then what would the point of having it be if it couldn't use when I'd want to use it? Happy Travels!

Certainly a foreigner can buy a condo, although I heard a while back about new regulations that foreigners can only buy condos from other foreigners, therefore the number of foreigners owning condos is gradually being reduced. If these regulations are in place then it strikes me as being a very sneaky way of eventually phasing out foreign ownership.

The rule is, in Thailand, that foreign ownership can be 49% of a condo building. So,if a new foreign buyer wants to buy in, then he/she must buy from that 49% of foreign ownership which I don't see as a bad thing. It's one way of balancing things out and not having the foreign population buy up lots of condos especially since they cost way less than they do, for example, here in L.A. and other places in the world...like Singapore which cost more than double for the same size condo one would buy in Bangkok. Happy Travels!

Personally I agree with Thailand's regulations on foreign ownership, for the very reasons you just stated. What frightens me away from buying is never knowing what's going to materialize near you in the future. This might not be a problem in established inner-city condo blocks with a good set of regulations in place that are well enforced. But it sure is risky in rural or decentralized areas. If there's any vacant land near you then you'll never know when the owner will rent it out to anybody for any use whatsoever. Temples nearby are dodgy too, they often hold fairs and set up sound systems like the Rolling Stones use, and you'll get some mad monk shouting into a mike for hours and hours. Thais love it but these things drive Farang mad. I've thanked God several times that I was only renting and could get out quick when these sorts of things happened to me.

Yes, what you're saying is totally understandable. One of the condos I looked at was in a very residential, quiet neighborhood with only other new to rarely new...high end... condo buildings around. Plus it was on a corner with nothing next to it on one side and a nice condo building on the other and no temples around. I know what you mean about noise at the temples as I go to Wat Thai in North Hollywood,Ca...the huge Thai temple that looks like it fell out of Thailand. On days when there are festivals I feel sorry for the people who live in that neighborhood since the temple is located in a residentual neighborhood....and folks are listening to loud Thai, live rock groups and talking through the loudspeakers while others are eating at the picnic tables outside. And then inside the temple are worsippers and there are folks running around in the educational building coming to and from Thai language class...lots of pitter-patter. Happy Travels!

People who just go to Thailand on holidays and stay at upmarket resorts don't know about this side of living in Thailand. When choosing somewhere to live (rent or buy) you must be so cautious and carefully check the vicinty out for noise & pollution sources.

I agree with you Texas Slim. That can really be said of buying or renting anywhere...including here in the U.S. It's just common sense to check all of these things out before buying or renting. Personally, I have lived back and forth between overseas and the States for 30-plus years and I have seen buildings go up and with unobstructive views and then a few years later something is thrown up to totally block the view...that's just one example. And of course, as you said, there's the noise problem. So, I think most people would figure all of this stuff out as best as possible before pluncking down hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy a place anywhere in the world. And, of course, some things are just unavoidable and out of one's control...and you just have to live with it. I've yet to find a living situation that's perfect. Happy Travels!