#  >  > Living And Legal Affairs In Thailand >  >  > Doing Things Legally >  >  Getting a Thai Mortgage for my Thai Wife?

## Thai Simon

Hey guys,

  I’m looking for advice on how to go about getting a Thai mortgage for my wife. We’ve been married and living in Thailand for a few years.

  She’s soon to give birth and we both feel it’s best for her to be a stay at home mom and house wife. (She was working until becoming pregnant).

  Unfortunately I don’t earn great money, but we both feel it’s enough for how we live, and is better than other options (so not comments on that please.  :Smile:  )

  I’d like my wife to get a mortgage for a cheap house somewhere outside of Bangkok. Phetburi-Kanchanaburi-Chiang Mai even, for us to live in.

  I use her bank account as an everyday account and around half my money is going in there every month (37k out of 60k income).

  So she can show 37k being transferred into her account every month, but cannot show proof of job or anything like that.

  Type of mortgage we’d look for would be something like a 2 million baht, 20 year mortgage, which would presumably buy a 1.5 mill house with the rest for interest. I’d like the option to pay it off sooner though.


  So question time.

  How to get a 20 yr mortgage for a Thai who doesn’t have a job or legal income??

  I heard something about they can set up a small legal business (in writing only) like a DFC, or DCB or something, which legally creates a small legal business for a self-employed Thai and costs about 3000thb a year in tax regardless of income (37000thb p/m in her case)? This would presumably make her income legal and be able to use it to finance a mortgage.


  How much income must a Thai have to get a 20 year, 2 mill baht mortgage? (With a bit of bank account wriggling I can increase the payments made to her account to show around 60k p/m).


  Thank you very much and I hope I get informative answers and not comments about other things in my posts.

  Thanks.

  Simon.

----------


## Marmite the Dog

We looked into doing something similar with the Midget showing 60k a month income. All 3 banks we spoke to only offered 50% on a 2m Baht house in a private village.

We didn't buy.

----------


## Thai Simon

^ thanks.

A bit surprising. 

And not good news for our idea.  :Smile: 

I would have presumed a Thai showing 60k p/m would have houses thrown at them, especially when only wanting one for only 1.5 mill.

It isn't a lot of money. Makes you wonder where do entire families living on less than that (say two parents earning 20k each) get mortgages to buy houses.

----------


## Thai Simon

If anyone else can offer other advice or experiences I'd be grateful to hear them.  :Smile:

----------


## 9999

> So she can show 37k being transferred into her account every month, but cannot show proof of job or anything like that.


We had similar issues. We have a business set up now and she can use the profits as income. May be worth setting up a small business just to syphon the money through, to get your mrs on the grid. Any finance we got had to be backed and guarunteed by assets, land in our case, already fully owned with chanote, which the bank holds.




> I would have presumed a Thai showing 60k p/m would have houses thrown at them, especially when only wanting one for only 1.5 mill.


Yes you'd think so. My mrs has had 6 figures dumped into her bank account on a monthly basis for 3 years, and a decent balance, but it counts for nothing. Depends on who you deal with, though with just deposits and no official 'income' or business, it will be tough to get a mortgage on what you are buying without a significant deposit. Meanwhile the som-tam stand lady with some tattered business documents and doctored income proof, will be building a 3M baht house next door after dottings the i's and crossing the t's.

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> Makes you wonder where do entire families living on less than that (say two parents earning 20k each) get mortgages to buy houses.


The holy grail is to get a government job. You will get loans (sometime interest free) and mortgages very easily.

Unsurprisingly, teachers, policemen, nurses et al, are just as likely to default on a loan as your common-or-garden variety of Thai.

----------


## buriramboy

> Originally Posted by Thai Simon
> 
> Makes you wonder where do entire families living on less than that (say two parents earning 20k each) get mortgages to buy houses.
> 
> 
> The holy grail is to get a government job. You will get loans (sometime interest free) and mortgages very easily.
> 
> Unsurprisingly, teachers, policemen, nurses et al, are just as likely to default on a loan as your common-or-garden variety of Thai.


Would getting someone with a government job to act as a guarantor (for a fee) work for the OP???

----------


## Simon43

Your wife needs to be able to show a regular income.  If she is self-employed, then she'll need at least 3 months, more likely 6 months of receiving this income.  She can register a self-employed business for just a few hundred baht, (eg stall, cleaning laundry etc) and you can drop money into her account every 'pay day'.

That might get you as far as the bank's front door...  Then you will need to be able to put down a deposit of perhaps 30% of the house price...

Then you need to talk with the right bank.  I've heard that the Islamic Bank is sympathetic to giving out loans.

Another approach is to find a new housing development which works with just one of the banks who will fund mortgages for the project's customers.  The housing project wants to sell you the house and they may be able to bend the rules or thing of 'creative' ways to get the mortgage.  (They did for my ex...)

Simon

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> Another approach is to find a new housing development which works with just one of the banks who will fund mortgages for the project's customers. The housing project wants to sell you the house and they may be able to bend the rules or thing of 'creative' ways to get the mortgage.


That's we we had hoped for.

----------


## 9999

> Would getting someone with a government job to act as a guarantor (for a fee) work for the OP???


Nope. They were pretty frank with us. Thai Planet. No proper job no loan. They fucked us around for 2 months anyway and refused to hand back house plans (I think they guy did actually lose them). Farmers credit union through the MIL was the way to go. But like I said before now she has a registered business and can show regular profit/ income we'll be sweet in future.

----------


## 9999

> She can register a self-employed business for just a few hundred baht, (eg stall, cleaning laundry etc) and you can drop money into her account every 'pay day'.


Yep that's the best course for the OP IMO. Wait out the six months after registering self-employed / business and you should be right.

----------


## Thai Simon

Thanks.

I'll look into two things.

One:

I just called her and her mother owns the family house and land in the middle of nowhere. I suppose this could be transferred into my wife's name (on the Chanote). I think this costs money as some gov. official has to come out to check the land and extort you.

This would at least give her a chanote. I can't imagine it's worth much though. Probably 1 or 2 hundred k.

Can anyone spell out the process of transferring the name on a Chanote?

Thanks.

Two:

Setting up a legal self employed business so she can show legal income.

Simon (or anyone else)



> She can register a  self-employed business for just a few hundred baht, (eg stall, cleaning  laundry etc) and you can drop money into her account every 'pay day'.


Do you know what the name of this is, and what government office she will have to go to. She hates dealing with Thai government offices almost as much as me.

It would be great to get the name of the form we need, what office we can get it at, and what office we submit it to... and what we are looking to get, a legal certificate? A Tax card with number on it? 

Thanks again.

----------


## Fondles

Save up a deposit like everyone else has to.

----------


## Thai Simon

^ Deposit wouldn't be too much of a problem if it's 25%-30%.

If it's 50% than it would be an inconvenient wait to get that saved.

Have you got expierence of it that you can pass on, as opposed to a smart comment?  :Smile:

----------


## 9999

> I just called her and her mother owns the family house and land in the middle of nowhere. I suppose this could be transferred into my wife's name (on the Chanote). I think this costs money as some gov. official has to come out to check the land and extort you.
> 
> This would at least give her a chanote. I can't imagine it's worth much though. Probably 1 or 2 hundred k.
> 
> Can anyone spell out the process of transferring the name on a Chanote?


Probably just easier sticking it in the MIL's name if you can trust her.




> Do you know what the name of this is, and what government office she will have to go to.


Not sure about self-employment, but we set up an Ordinary Partnership business which was pretty painless and didn't cost much; less than 5K bt. Mrs owns 51%, we can both show profits as income but I'm not permitted to work. We got it structured with the mrs taking a management wage and bonuses so it doesn't show as profit. Not too sure about tax obligations and understand it's about how creative you are with your accounting.

----------


## dirtydog

> I just called her and her mother owns the family house and land in the middle of nowhere. I suppose this could be transferred into my wife's name (on the Chanote). I think this costs money as some gov. official has to come out to check the land and extort you.


3,000 odd baht to find and mark the boundaries, then some tax on transfer of chanote.

----------


## TizMe

I think Thai banks are still like Aus banks were 30 years ago.
You first have to prove why you don't need a loan before they will approve you for one.

----------


## Simon43

The self-employment registration is called a 'Book Khon Tamada'  (sorry no Thai on this keyboard..) and you register very quickly at your local Tessabahn office.  You do not need a lawyer etc to do this - it's a very easy process and then means that her personal income is all assumed to be business income from her sole-trader business, and is taxed accordingly, (but at a low rate).  With this registration she can also open a sole-trader bank account

Simon

----------


## DrAndy

> Have you got expierence of it that you can pass on, as opposed to a smart comment?


even "smart comments" can have some truth in them worth noting

we went to a bank to investigate a mortgage or even a loan for building

we were offered a very low % interest, which sounded good

then that turned out to be only for the first year

then there were all sorts of fees and commisions to pay

then if we wanted to pay back the whole loan in the near future, all sorts of other fees

we just walked away, it was really not worth the hassle

----------


## 9999

we ended up using the farmer's bank through the in-laws. After a bad experience applying at Thai Planet, where they refused to give us an answer and wouldn't give back the house plans. I think the little tosser lost them, they never did show up.   Farmer's bank has been great and don't need to make first repayment for a year after taking out the loan.

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> we ended up using the farmer's bank through the in-laws. After a bad experience applying at Thai Planet, where they refused to give us an answer and wouldn't give back the house plans. I think the little tosser lost them, they never did show up.   Farmer's bank has been great and don't need to make first repayment for a year after taking out the loan.


What percentage of the total budget did they give you?

----------


## 9999

^ Dunno the details they released it in like 200K lots. We're eligible to borrow 2M, house is almost finished and think it has cost about 1.2M. Will update in the building thread.

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> We're eligible to borrow 2M


What makes that possible? I presume the mortgage is against the value of a _chanote_ held by the outlaws?

The Midget was showing a taxable income of at least 60k a month and they still only offered 50% of the value of the property (1.8m) for a newly built house on a private estate.

----------


## 9999

> What makes that possible? I presume the mortgage is against the value of a chanote held by the outlaws?


Exactly. We couldn't show legit income at the time, so had to go this route.

----------


## buriramboy

> Originally Posted by Marmite the Dog
> 
> What makes that possible? I presume the mortgage is against the value of a chanote held by the outlaws?
> 
> 
> Exactly. We couldn't show legit income at the time, so had to go this route.


Are Thai banks happy then if you have no legit income in Thailand to give a mortgage solely against the value of another chanote????

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> Originally Posted by 9999
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by Marmite the Dog
> ...


Thai banks seem much happier knowing lending against land than lending to someone who has a decent income and can repay it easily.

----------


## 9999

> Are Thai banks happy then if you have no legit income in Thailand to give a mortgage solely against the value of another chanote????


No, they're complete wankas about it, but the farm bank let us do it. I think we needed a photo of the MIL pretending to be making som tum at a stand or some shit. We also have a good bank history but it's all in random deposits from overseas.

----------


## alitongkat

possibly an extraordinary high interest rate for the money above the securities?

most likely the extra money isnt a mortgage, but some other loan???

----------


## buriramboy

> Originally Posted by buriramboy
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by 9999
> ...


Interesting, but i fear i may have foked up here then as i seem to remember (from what little interest i took at the time) then when i had the land transferred into my daughters name, the woman in the office was questioning the wife as to why were putting the land in daughetrs name and not hers as meant you wouldn't be able to sell it or borrow money against it until daughter was 20, think my daughter was only about 2 or 3 at the time. :Smile:

----------


## Marmite the Dog

^ Yes, you fucked up regarding getting a loan against the land.

I think it'll be easier to get a loan rather than a mortgage for, say, 1m Baht. It's not like you'd spend 20 years paying it back anyway. I'm sure a 4 or 5 year repayment plan would at whatever the loan rate is, would work out cheaper than 20 years at the mortgage rate, and they wouldn't need such high security for it, if car loans are anything to go by. Of course, some will say "but the car is the security", but the same can be said of whatever you're borrowing the 1m Baht for.

----------

