drilldr

I have to give credit when due and I need to give other boardies a heads up on an alternative ride to and from BKK to Pattaya. I have used just a taxi from the airport, a friend, Mr Toom and now I always use Mr. Virach Songklam (Mr. Virach). He has always been courteous, timely and speaks good english. Also, the bonus is he is a long time resident of Pattaya and no more hitting town wandering around looking for the nearest police box to get directions for your driver to get to your hotel. He has always called me if he is running late and he is just simply a very nice man. I heartily recommend him! He has created a web site where I found him. www.vrtaxiprivate.com Please give him a try. It's 1200 bht either way with tolls!

This is well said advice and is exactly part of my plan. Why pay state taxes? Go get your residency established in like Nevada. Then you only have the Feds sucking you dry. I live in Calif and it would be lunacy to retire outta here as a resident and pay these f^&ks all that unnecessary tax money! Look at every possible way to take other peoples hands out of your pockets before you head out of here.

Thanks for the replys. The project is the Northshore condos off Soi 4 and Beach. I had wanted to keep it for long term as I had hoped to some day live in Pattaya in semi retirement. The project is all sold out and I was one of the last people to get involved there. I am concerned that when I go (in 3 days) Raimon (the builder) is going to tell me anything I want to hear to get their remaining money. I have already resigned myself that I may need to walk away. It's not Raimon I really distrust, it's the fickle winds that blow with the Thai govt. I'm really between a rock and a hard place with this as I suspect many others are in this project.

I need some advice now that I've read numerous threads incl. thaivisa.com forum. It's all very confusing to me. I have put some money down on a condo and it was via a thai corp. Now, I can't decide if I should follow through with the purchase or back out and cut my loses. If I back out I'll get hurt but I worry if I go through that either 1. I get caught up in this 'new' crackdown on foreign corps. and / or 2. I can never sell because I do not have outright ownwership and never will. Any advice would be greqtly appreciated. Thanks

Thanks Shit Happens! (Love your board name BTW!) I will look into this as I just have a very bad feeling what a water damage or fire scenario would do to ruin those rosey retirement plans.

Anyone have any first hand experience with having insurance for the real estate and personal property you own? I'm considering purchasing either a home or condo but I'm concerned about some kind of worse case scenario where you could have property damage and/or loss of personal effects. It could be expensive and a real setback financially if you don't have anything in place. Thanks.

I had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Toom my last trip Feb 19th this year. I can honestly say he was just as he advertised. Punctual and great service. Highly recommend as he is a nice man as well. I will use him again.

I noticed more on my last trip that not all but many thai drivers if they see you (and I'm guessing) are Falang, they tend to come right at you in an intimidating way. Like a bizarre game of chicken with you. I had this happen many times only to quickly get the hell out of the way or watch them make some kind of last second correction. It really rattled me a couple of times and it seemed that it was intentional as it was something I really ever saw between 2 thais. WTF I found I really had to have my head on a swivel and not let my guard down for a second. I just completed another MSF course and I can honestly say I think it saved my bacon a couple of times.

Thanks guys for the great replys! Shawn

I've tried to search for a thread about this but to no avail. My question is that if you bring your money to LOS and by a property, is there any degree of difficulty transferring it back to where you can from due to Thai laws, etc after you sell? I live in the states and it concerns me that I should rethink whatever capitol investment I bring to LOS if it could be mired down in Thai banks. Thanks

Very funny! It looks like the filmaker made use of casting a couple of the Russkies I saw milling around in Pats this past New Years. They just combed their hair!

Yesterday police found Fujiyama Sakahura dead under ruskie bar girl "Tiny" Tatayana Nerova. Friends say Fuji just wanted ST from Tiny but now he has no time. Things apparently got out of hand when she fell asleep after too many LD's. Fuji's digital camera was found with him as well. His hand still on the shutter button. I guess it's the old rule, 'be carefull what you wish for'?

He's been here 3 weeks and seems to be very happy to be in LOS http://traveler95765.tripod.com/ET.mpg

Those early years working on Soi 6 at the Foxy Bar were hell!

Excellent thread and great post Pete, I have been self employed for 24 years and I can tell you the anxiety of what and how to deal with your next situation just never goes away. I can only imagine that if a person was to go to a foreign country and try and buy a business like a bar they need to think long and hard. Especially if they have never been self employed. You will be so ill prepared and the learning curve has to be severe at best and very expensive. Be prepared for a lot of sleepless days ( I guess you'd be working at night) and just stress in general. The competition looks fierce. The other point is that you will have the biggest headache of all ... employees. What with the langauge and cultural differences. Most employees will be very young and poorly educated and you are going to pin your livleyhood on this group to do their job. Maybe with a partner to share the stress but if you don't have an ulcer now you will probaly have one when it is said and done. Maybe not for everyone. but it's probably a safe bet that the two most exciting days of being a bar owner in a situation like Pattaya, Thailand are the day you buy it and the day you sell it.

They danced the night away ...

She doesn't BF'd more than 3 times a week I hear.

The Russian chicks on WS are starting to scare me. This one was only available for ST. Not that I know that much about that shit!

I don't know if any retirees in the area would care to, but if they could keep an online blog of what their retired life is like maybe it would give some good insights for those of us pondering what that would be like. It would be great to get some good pulse on day to day life of a retiree in the area. My perfect vision for myself would be to live comfortably, cheaply and enjoy all that the area has to offer. I only travel there for breaks and that is ceratinly as close as I can get to what month to month life might be like for an expat. But it's really not like calling Pats home like a retiree would. I hope to try and retire to Thailand in the future and I'll check it out as much as I can, hoping I've made the right decision. Just my 2 cents. Really like your web sites concept! Keep up the good work.