Gary

Winston kept his schemes pretty quiet. He was convinced that he could make enough money to stay in Pattaya and didn't want anyone stealing his ideas. The hotel scheme required major investors of which he was NOT one. He wanted to manage and run an expat hotel. It may have worked but guys with money thought the Winston may not be that stable and it would be too risky to invest that much money. Jacko, if I were PC, I would have said "long term Pattaya expats". I'm not PC and besides that, I have a few years on you. LOL! You're still a bit of a pup.

The old timers here will remember a guy named Winston. He had an Internet business and would take photos from customers and have them painted by Pattaya artists. I know he used several different shops and all were pretty good. His business was pretty slow until he guaranteed the work. I thought it was chancy but he allowed the customers to see the paintings before they sent him the money. As far as I know, he never got cheated. So, yes, there are a number of shops that do that kid of work.

Years ago, Songkran was a lot of fun, no ice water, no high pressure sprayers and no chunks of ice in buckets of water. It has been totally ruined and I stay away from the idiots anyway I can. I have a good friend who likes to come over this time of year. I told him last year that if he comes over during this corrupted holiday, that he is on his own. No way I will ever be in Pattaya during this bullshit.

I'm not sure that buying the top model is a good idea if you are buying it new. My Focus Ghia was 938,000 baht back in 2007. I could have saved a LOT of money had I bought the much cheaper model and it would have probably been just as easy to sell. I was forced to keep my car long term because selling a car for one third of what it cost me seemed like too much of a loss. Especially with only 30,000 kilometers on the clock.

If I had it to do again, I wouldn't buy the sports model. Mine drives like it is on rails and is probably the best handling car I have ever owned. The problem with that is the suspension is pretty stiff. I would prefer a better ride.

Someone got a great deal. I have a 2007 Focus Ghia and it is a very good car. No problems since new. The only problem with Fords is that if you buy one, you should plan on keeping it for the long term because trying to sell one sucks.

Owning condo's with a bogus company likely puts you in an even worse situation than just paying taxes.

Some of the expats have quite successful rental businesses. They may own a half a dozen condos and enjoy a good monthly income. Most of those guys like to rent to farangs. I think it's just a matter of time before the government comes knocking on their door for taxes and back taxes. With immigration cracking down, the renters need a document stating where they live from the owner of the house or condo. It's just a matter of the government putting 2 and 2 together and finding out who the owners are. I'm surprised that hasn't happened already. The tax law already exists.

Shady lawyers come up with all sorts of schemes to protect a property in the event of a relationship going bad. As far as I know none of the schemes are worth the paper they are written on. I have never hired a lawyer to protect property that I have purchased for my wife. Everything I have given my wife is exactly that, HERS. Trying to use some scheme will just cost you more money for the slimy lawyer. Make sure you are able financially to walk away and then you know exactly where you are at. Going to a bank to try to get a sizable long term loan will be wasting your time. It WON'T happen.

Renting out your condo to pay the rent for a house is a sound idea. A 2 million baht condo will rent for about the same price as a 5 million baht house. As for the HIGH end properties, that is a different situation, but unless the owner is really lucky, the house/condo is likely to remain empty.

Yesterday I ordered a new GPS from Eagle GPS. I chose a Nuvi 55, 5 inch screen. It was 4,990B and is now reduced to 3,990B. They also added free lifetime map updates. I was bragging about my old Nuvi 750 and now it is freezing up. Both the 750 and the 855 are no longer to be trusted. They don't last forever. Since the new Garmins no longer play my Audible books, I bought an iPod that will plug into my car stereo. I'm definitely NOT an Apple fanboy but here in Thailand the iPod is the only player I could find that is compatible with Audible Books. Repair costs for those old Nuvi's are m

Sounds like a good plan. Can you PM your phone number? I'll give you a call the next time I am in Jomtien.

For most two week millionaires, it may be better to follow the three "F's" The three F's are if it floats, fucks or flies, it's cheaper to rent.

Years ago I when I lived in Bangkok, I wanted to go on a river dinner cruise. My then girlfriend told me that she knew where the river boat was. Off we went. I thought we were doing fine until I saw a sign the looked to me like buses only. Sure enough a cop pulled me over. He asked me where I was going. He did speak some English and told me that this road was for buses only. He was looking at me wanting some kind of an answer. I pointed at my girlfriend, he grinned and just shook his head. He told me to make a U turn and stopped the traffic so I could do it. He got on his motorcycle and waved

Years ago here in Thailand, I enjoyed traveling around the country. I always tried to have the latest maps but many times I relied on a compass to get off the beaten path. I found that none of the roads go straight north, south, east or west. I have taken good paved roads and some ended up making a big circle with me ending up where I started. Because of many mountains, the roads couldn't go any further and went in a big circle passing through small villages. Using just the compass was not a good idea if you had a specific destination in mind. It was fun and an adventure. You would be surprise

I'm certainly not an expert regarding Thai land documents, but, my wife says there are many kinds of land documents. The best one is a red seal chanote. All chanotes are good but the color of the seal is also important. Different color seals place different restrictions on the use of the property. These are similar to zoning rules.

For me, the GPS is often not a good thing. I have gotten dependent on the thing and no longer pay attention to where I am going. I blindly follow the directions it gives me. I normally take different routes because I hate to see the same scenery every trip. The Garmin makes it easy to vary the routes and add a number of different waypoints. Then by using shortest route, fastest route and avoidances, the routes can be and are usually different every trip. Without the GPS, I couldn't vary my routes to that extent each trip. Like everything else in life, there are good and bad things with technol

I have two friends up here who have built homes on land that has no chanote. The land is definitely not legally theirs. They were told that if they build a home on the land that there will be no problems. They are worried and I would be too if I were in their positions. A lot of land like that was given to poor farmers by the government with the condition that it could never be sold and could only be passed on to immediate family members. Many of these farmers have illegally sold the land. Some Hi-So Thais have built huge homes and resorts on this type of land and are being forced to tear the

Road work is definitely a problem for GPS units. No possible way to keep up with the government tearing up sections of the roads. I don't know if all Garmins have a detour option but both of mine do. The detour option was really handy when the colored shirt assholes had many roads blocked.

The condition of putting the property in her name is to never spend more than you can comfortably afford to walk away from.The old saying of never putting all your eggs in one basket is especially applicable here in Thailand. Old farts like me have to safeguard what we have. We can never make a comeback if we are stupid.Thailand is a great place to retire as long as you have money. This is NOT a good place to be if you are broke. I am not wealthy but I am comfortable.

About ten years ago, I was told about a piece of land that was supposedly owned by an old lady who wanted to retire. It was a twelve rai beautiful scenic place. It was surrounded by high rock formations and near a waterfall with only one way in and out. I was assured that none of the land in that area had chanotes and owning that land was no problem. I took my Thai wife to look at it. She talked to the supposed owner and then was ready to go home. She told me that land belonged to the government and did not belong to that old lady and that no way could she sell it. My wife was correct. As

A friend of mine from Florida had a full dresser Harley. One day he unexpectedly sold it. I asked him why he sold something that he loved. He certainly didn't need the money. He told me that one morning he woke up and couldn't remember how he had gotten home. He looked outside and his Harley was sitting there. He found out that none of his drinking buddies had taken him home and had driven the Harley to his home for him. He decided it was time to sell it.

Maybe I just posted that information to increase my post count............. No, that doesn't make any sense. My post count is already quite high. I guess that I am just lucky. Perhaps a farang friend of mine up here and myself are the only ones in Thailand to have this problem. Or are you suggesting that I am a liar?

Strange things are happening with the phones here. I was having problems with Truemove H. I finally called them and was told that my SIM was not registered. ? The same with Dtac. Apparently they jumped the gun by interfering with my service. To make a long story short, my wife went and registered AIS 12 call (2 SIMs) and Dtac. I registered my Truemove H card myself because that is my main service. All the problems went away and all are now working fine. I use Dtac and the Truemove H card in a dual SIM phone. I kept Dtac rather than AIS 12 call because I can easily extend the Dtac card validit

Location? You can get nearly anywhere in Pattaya for ten baht from anywhere in the city. I'll take RG over this anytime. Sorry.