Thailand Business Directory

According to Bot latest Press Release, the Thai economy continued to be on a decelerating trend in October. The value of merchandise exports continued to contract, mainly due to the economic slowdown of trading partners, consistent with deterioration in manufacturing production and private investment indicators.

Public spending contracted after last month’s expansion, from capital expenditures. However, private consumption indicators expanded at a higher pace compared with the previous month after temporarily benefiting from the government’s economic stimulus measures. The tourism sector also continued to expand well.?

          On the stability front, headline inflation edged lower on the back of falling energy prices while core inflation held steady. The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate slightly decreased, in line with the rising number of employed persons in agricultural sector. T…

The new Land and Property Tax which will be effective from January 2020 onward, is another challenge for the Thai property market. 

One of the sectors that will be impacted is vacant land. There are still many unused sites in Bangkok. Owners of these sites will have to start paying significant taxes for the first time once the new land tax comes into effect in January next year.

Many of these owners want to avoid paying the higher rate empty land tax by developing some commercial use on these sites which will generate enough income to pay the new land tax so that they do not have to sell the land.

The risk for many owners is that in their rush to develop commercial use to avoid paying the higher tax rate they create a bigger financial burden for themselves by developing inappropriate loss-making developments.

Lacking expertise, experience and market knowledge, they may end up building something for which there is no dema…

The recent restrictive measures from the Bank of Thailand (BOT) have continued to cast a shadow over Bangkok’s condominium market since the beginning of this year.

Condominium sales have dropped, putting pressure on developer’s financial targets. Some developers have sought to diversify their risk in pure residential development projects for sale by seeking to develop alternative sources of revenue from recurring income properties. 

Growing concerns about excessive residential mortgage lending by commercial banks prompted the BOT to reduce loan-to-value ratios (LTV ratios) for second and subsequent home mortgages starting from 1st April 2019. CBRE believes the new measures have significantly reduced the number of speculative buyers and buy-to-rent investors of residential condominium units.

A slowdown in the condominium market has encouraged major residential developers to consider diversifying their portfolios into other property sectors …