Buying as an investment now, keep for retirement later?

[Dmon81]

How practical is it to buy a property in Thailand (probably a condo/apartment since cannot own land easily) and to rent it out to a long-term tenant or a series of medium-term tenants?

How realistic is it to purchase a property like this with the goal of renting now & then living in it yourself down the line in retirement?  Or do the risks outweigh benefits here?

The advantage of this route is to buy while properties are still relatively inexpensive in Thailand.  I would guess that by the time I retire in 15-20 years, it will be much more costly to own something.

Apologies if this has been previously covered. I could not find a post that exactly matched my question.

[fatjack1]

I think the big risk is you may not want to live there in 15-20 years.  And a condo isn't a Liquid asset.  What you want now may not be what you want when you retire.  

 

 

 

[gitteyman]

With the strong bhart                                                                                                   A sluggish rental market                                                                                           and condo maintenance                                                                                           

 

Yep you should go for it.!

[Biennial]

Yeah, Pattaya is likely to change considerably in the next 20 years. Maybe better to invest in a property in farangland.

[Dmon81]

Not necessarily Pattaya then, maybe some other part of Thailand?

Probably best to invest smart back home & then decide where to buy overseas for retirement later.  Maybe it'll be a different country altogether that we should be targeting.

[Petesie]

I've been looking at condo's for a while; 5 years ago a large 2 bed unit came up in a complex I liked, at the time it worked out at 75k (4.5m).

I noticed recently it's been reduced to 2.99m...which works out at...79k.

I don't think they're going to get any cheaper. 

[chris2004]

Depends on why you want to retire in Pattaya. The girls are almost unaffordable now, certainly will be in 10+ years. But if you are coming to Pattaya for it's great beach (!) then fine.

[Dmon81]

Depends on why you want to retire in Pattaya. The girls are almost unaffordable now, certainly will be in 10+ years. But if you are coming to Pattaya for it's great beach (!) then fine.

I wasn’t thinking specifically in Pattaya. Thailand in general — is there some place worth buying now and holding as an investment / awaiting retirement. Ones gotta believe prices will just go up and up.

Wanting to retire in Thailand (believable) is a different idea than retiring in Pattaya (yikes!)

Does this change people’s thoughts? Has anybody else had similar thoughts ?


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[Mognam]

In my opinion a long term investment in a condo in Thailand is a high risk with potentially low return.  Currently there are to many unknowns in the future, e.g. value of the baht to your currency, the Thai government , the rental market, rules for foreign investment and so on.

Safer to make a sensible investment in the West.  Down the track if you still want to live/retire in Thailand use that investment to fund it.

If you were planning on going sooner then it might be time to consider buying a permanent place to reside.

Also if you are well off enough to not worry about making a loss then you could also think about taking the risk.

[Buddy Edgewood]

From what I've seen, unless you have the cash to buy into one of the more popular condo buildings (VT6, Base, etc), I can't see how it's worth the time and effort - renting it out can be a real pain.  By my own estimates there are likely 1000+ condos sitting empty in Pattaya.  IMO, the Pattaya RE market is a big bubble ready to pop, but something (or someone) is propping up the market.  Better to invest in RE back home, where you can actively manage it yourself.  But even with that, the RE market in America is very high at the moment.  In many markets I've researched, rents aren't high enough to cover a mortgage payment with 20% down+monthly expenses (HOA, general repairs, etc).  Lately, I've been dumping my money into in tax-exempt municipal bonds, they're not a great return, but it's a safe investment in these turbulent times.  Perhaps if there's a dip in the American RE market during the recession that's coming in the next year or two, I'll jump back in.