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I suppose I am not the right person to reply. I have a family and we have a house the other side of Sirkhumvit. I was advised to rent rather than buy a condo. Reason - the value will depend on how the whole development is maintained. If not done the value will crash. If you rent you can just move elsewhere. If there a re a lot of empty cocnods then it will not be maintained. Also Thais do not like paying maintenanace. I like a house - less noisy neighbour problems. I agree that you should rent first while you look round. We rented a house and found a great bargain when we bought. With the state of the pound (and to a lesser extent the dollar) I would only rent now. Bring in that money when they are stronger. Yes you can get bargains now but you still lose out on currency conversion. There are some great bargains on rental.

I heard it was 100% inport duty. When I saw a new Merc. E saloon in a mall it was twice UK price. I asked the salesman if that was correct. He then told me about the 100% duty. You can get a 7 seater 4x4 Toyota Fortuner Auto for about 1.25 Million Baht. Nice car - diesel 3 litre. The 2.7 Litre petrol is less, but slower then the diesel.

LMG have prices based on your age. They are in 5 year bands (cannot remember whether it is 50 to 54 or 55 to 55). Also if you are in the same band whne you renew for the next year it will go up. This is because their band prices go up every year - like everything else.

I agree with the post about going to see AA Insurance. We use them for our health insurance. We looked at BUPA and LMG through them. The one through the Expats club is intended as a minimum cover for those who do not want to pay for the fuller cover. I agree 3M Baht is not too much. You will get exclusions for pre-existing conditions. Thats why you should choose an insurer you will stay with. By swithching your list of exclusions could grow each time. AA insurance is alongside Big C on Sirkhumvit road, just by Pattaya South Road. As you look at the front of Big C it is down the right hand side in a line of shops. They are very helpful and will be happy to discuss. They will have price lists for the insurers. The price is determined by your age. Your existing illnesses just imapct the exclusions. Number one rule is have health insurance in Thailand. You can exclude outpatients and get a discount. The outpatients cover is a question of do you think you will get enough bills to exceed the discount. You can also exclude USA and Europe, which also gives a discount. You can alsways get travel insurance if you visit USA or Europe and get more cover that way. The Thailand cover does not give enough for the bills in USA, so it may be worth excluding anyway and doing a seperate insurance when you visit USA. If you have more questions just add to the post.

Let me add my 3 pence - as we used to say in the UK. Now it should be 3 ponuds. If you change your currency from UK pounds to another currency now, you are going to get todays bad exchange rate. So I would not look to move out of UK pound until it recovers some of its old value. It may not reach 2 dollars to the pound but it should recover some. Where to be safe. You are guaranteed 50,000 UK pounds per person per bank. So if you stay in UK pounds, split it across as many banks as you need to. To get a good return. As has been said before the higher the return, the higher the risk. When I retired and moved to Thailand I got out of shares and put the money in banks to get the interest. I wanted to play safe. I still have all my money, but have a poor interest. But if I was in shares I would have lost a lot. So I am happy on what I did and am hoping the interest rates rise. At this time I do believe there is any way you can have a win win situation. You can have safe and low earnings OR risky and better earnings.

I also had a kidney stone done earlier this year at Bangkok Pattata Hospital. The urologist was called Dr. Jimmy. Jimmy is his nickname. His real name is half a kilometer long. All the staff know who Dr.Jimmy is.

I would suggest you get professional advice. Look at my reply to the other medical question. I put more details in and some questions you need to ask yourself. 20 quotes sounds too many to choose from. Unless they are for the same insurer. I believe they will not be much less than going through a reliable broker. We checked our car insurance and it was the same through a broker as buying direct. I would say do not look at just the cost. Look at what you get and most important the reliability of the insurance company (will it still be there when I need it in the future). I considered only large international companies.

We have insurance for the family in Pattaya. Me, wife and 2 children. It depends on what cover you need. The Expats is OK for basic cover but the limits are not high. I dealt with AA Insurance (next to Big C on Sirkhumvit Road). The owner sets up the Expats insurance. He also speaks at the Expat meeting on Insurance. He is English. I suggest you contact him to give you advice. We looked at BUPA and LMG Insurance. Not much between them in price. We chose LMG because of the flexibility of options. From what I discovered, is that the rate is based only on age. All the things already wrong with you are listed as pre-existing exclusions (either permanent or for a period). It is pointless not declaring pre-existing conditions because the hospital will soon know and the insurance company will not pay. The above means that you want an insurance company that will stay around and do not plan to switch around. Any new illness during your your time with the first company will be excluded by the company you switch to. On 65 you need to be insured by a reputable company before that age and then you can continue. The premiums get expensive though. Trying to get new insurance after 65 is very difficult and you would then be left to do self insurance (i.e. pay yourself). Blood pressure usually leads to exclusions of related illnesses. While on Blood Pressure I cannot get my UK medicine in Thailand (and some other countries I visit). I have had to switch to another medicine. On outpatients cover in the insurance, it is purely a financial calculation. Outpatient is cheap here and so we have been selective - some of the family have it some not. You can save on the premium by excluding USA and Europe. Then you need to get travel insurance when you visit them. This works out cheaper if you do not travel there much. Also I am told that the cover included for these areas is not high enough anyway (USA medical costs!!!). If you have a Thai wife/GF then they tend not to believe in insurance. Now my wife does.

I bought a Toyota Fortuner new from a Pattaya dealer (left on Sirkhumvit going North) and we have a warranty of 100,00 kms or 5 years (I think 5 years but need to check the actual number), which ever comes first. This is similar to UK warranties. The car is not yet 2 years old and we service it regularly at the dealer. The cost is very low - just oil etc. We tried to negotiate a discount and and got a very small amount off. What we did get is a load of options thrown in free. The car is delivered to the dealer without any options and the dealer adds them. So this is where they have more flexibilty.

I would suggest you try getting a second quote from a reputable broker. We use AA Insurance who are alongside Big C on Sirkhumvit Road, Pattaya. We use them. The owner speaks at the Expat meeting and provides the Expat insurance. He is English and gives good advice.

Thanks for the replies. Also for the advice on the painting - that well know typo.

This is a basic question. But I am not in Thailand and my Thai wife is told something strange by our bank. I think the bank thinks I want to keep the money as UK pounds in Thailand That is not what I want to do. If I sent money from UK to Thailand in UK pounds direct to my THai bank account (Bangkok Bank) will they just convert to Baht at the THailand rate and put in my account. Or do I have to do special arrangements with the Thai bank for the conversion to Baht. At the moment I convert to Baht in the UK and send Baht. This is, I believe, losing me money. The UK conversion rate is a lot worse than the rate in Thailand. Does anyone do as I ask. That is, there is no special arrangements needed for the UK pounds to go into my account.

I have a 4 year old son in school in Pattaya. He was born in the UK and we moved to Pattaya at the end of last year. We looked at three schools. Best and one on Sirkhumvit Road near the Mini Siam (one name is Witayu - I think). We saw those first and then went to Regent. Regent is very much in a different league. When we saw Regent it had to be the one. It is expensive - about 4,500 UK pounds a year for a 4 year old. They have their prices on their web site. My son had an Australian teacher who was great. She had a Thai helper and the class size was about 15. All lessons are in English. I believe as they get older there are a few Thai lessons as well. I think Best and the other one we looked at is split between English and Thai. Other schools in the area are St Andrews some distance south and one near Burapha Golf Course north of Pattaya. I have not seen these. Someone in our village sent their 6 year old son to Montesouri school but is transferring to Regent for the next term. At Regent the terms follow the UK school year. We are in the middle of the long summer holiday. Start again end of August. Regent have a school bus and the cost depends on where you live. We do not use it currently but may next term. If you need more information add to this post. I strongly recommend going to see the schools and do it in term time. One of the schools we visited loked like unorganized chaos.

My wife has a house about 15km outside Udon Thani. She started to build before I asked her to come to the Uk, where we married. We are now back in Pattaya. The house is 2 bed, bath and large lounge area. It is so large it is much bigger than the rest in the village. We have a problem selling it. No one can afford it. It is on about a quarter of a rai of land. The value of the house and land is about 400,000 baht. Ours is steel frame, concrete walls etc. Land is not so expensive up there. So I would think they should get a good house with more land for 500,000 baht. As said earlier, houses in the villages are small wooden structures with little space. So for the budget I suggest they would get a mansion in comparison.

I live on Siam Country Club Road (East Pattaya) beyond the cross roads to Crocodile Farm (near the reservoir. We have a taxi service to Sirkhumvit about every 15 minutes up till 6pm. It turns off Siam Country club at the cross roads and goes down Nabprabwan to Central Road and then along Sirkhumvit to Naklua. When I first arrived with the family we did not have a car. We used taxis. I would not consider a motorbike in East Pattaya after dark. Some do but I was warned by the locals it is not safe. You can get taxis outside the big supermarkets until they close. We used the Carrefor a lot (usually 200 to 150 to go back at night. They close about 11pm. We now have a car. 4x4 Toyota - you need it from the state of the roads in rainy season. Makes life much easier. Now we do not have to question if we should go into town - just hop in the car. My Thai wife is learning to drive. So drinking may be less of a problem. We bought new because we wanted a Fortuna and second hand are few are not much cheaper than new. Always get 1st class insurance. Mine was about 30K Baht. Driving is not so difficult if you take it slowly at the start. I worry what it will be like driving in the UK again. As mentioned before there may be more taxis as the East side is expanding fast and there are new roads being built. You have a choice. Live near town and use taxis OR live further out and get a better quality of life for the family and drive.