Land Tax

[FrazeeDK]

http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/175931/land-tax-is-a-worthy-goal

http://www.bangkokpost.com/life/financialadvice/36341/cabinet-oks-draft-bill-on-new-land-tax

As any of you with TW/TG and land holdings know, the current property taxes are very very low for the comparitive worth of land/houses. If this bill gets passed by Parliament, then beware the Tax Assessors!! Whoever in the Land Office gets the assessor jobs will end up being richer than a Customs Agent.. Assessing the value versus perceived worth of property can be very subjective.. I figure our place is probably worth 3-5 million Baht.. That doesn't mean we could sell it for that... IF and when the assessor visits, will the fact that the property is "associated" with a Farang cause the assessment to go up??? Per the article "The maximum land tax rate would be 0.5% of the value as appraised by the Treasury Department during the initial stage." If the assessor were to value our propety at the high end, that would mean an annual tax of roughly 20,000 Baht.. Not a killer total but getting close to U.S. property tax...

And of course, the fear would be that for those of us with TW's that went with them to the Land Office and signed the "not my money, not my land" document, is the Chanote flagged in the Land database as "associated" with a Farang..???

The supposed intent of the bill is to tax "unused" land to force land speculators to sell it for more productive use instead of sitting on it.. We'll see what happens..

[nkstan]

I think the law is a valid and needed one,but as with all the other laws of a endemic corrupt society,not of maximum value to the people as a whole.

There is no doubt that falangs will always be scapegoated and taken advantage of in this type of system,!So,yes,plan on paying the surcharges,after all,YOU ARE RICH and it is relatively small in comparison to the West

We should not expect anything to go our way and when it does,accept it as an individual gift or a mistake,because that is exactly what it is!

[parrot]

This being Thailand, anything is possible (as in juntas, coups, mass exodus, or happy-days-are-here-again, or even 50/$1). But back on topic, here are a few pertinent extracts from the article that I read:


Finance Minister Korn Chatikavanij said the exact tax rates under the law had not yet been set.

The maximum land tax rate would be 0.5% of the value as appraised by the Treasury Department during the initial stage.

The initial draft bill sets ceilings on the tax rates for three types of land: farmland (not over 0.05%), residential land (not over 0.1%), and others, including commercial shop houses and unused land (not over 0.5%), according to a source at the ministry. (The way I read this.....most folks would be looking at 0.1% vs. 0.5%)

The process to enact the new taxes is expected to take about four years - two years to pass through parliament and two years for the grace period to expire, Mr Korn said. (given the state of affairs in the government today, does the existing parliament accomplish anything?)

I'd not worry about different taxes for falangs, not much in the way of precedence for this: I pay 20 baht a month for garbage, like all the villagers. My water and electric rates are the same as others (although I pay zillions more because I use ac), auto registration/license/insurance all the same. More than anything......4 years from now in Thai politics is a lifetime..........I'm just wondering what's going to happen in the next 2 weeks.

[Bandung_Dero]

Glad we only built a humble looking Thai styled home so shouldn't pay any more than our neibours. Don't know about other Western countries but in Australia annual land taxes (rates) on single dwelling properties are assessed on the land value only not the value of the building. This statement reads the same to me

residential land

. Going on recent sales in the village our land value is about 120,000 Baht so I guess our tax rate would be 120 Baht, affordable even for the Thais.