Buying Property in Phuket as a Foreigner: Ownership, Process & Costs

This guide is for someone outside Thailand, or newly arrived, who is considering a condominium, a villa or a plot of land in Phuket and wants to understand the ground rules before looking at listings. It covers what a foreign buyer can own, the condominium foreign quota, the routes buyers meet for houses and land, the buying process step by step, the fee types at the Land Office and the differences between a resale and a new build.

It does not cover visas, tax residency, financing or inheritance planning, and it is not legal advice. Thai property law is applied to the specific title deed, building and buyer, so the most reliable answer for your purchase comes from an independent lawyer who reads the documents. Hiring a lawyer is not a legal requirement for every ordinary purchase, but independent legal review is strongly recommended. Planetarium Real Estate is not a law firm, tax adviser, visa agency or bank.

Thai law draws a clear line between units in a condominium and land. A foreign buyer can own a condominium unit outright (freehold) in their own name, within a limit the Condominium Act sets for each registered condominium: units owned by foreigners may not together exceed 49 per cent of the combined floor area of all the units in that condominium. Land is different. As a rule a foreign buyer cannot own land in their own name; the Land Code and related legislation provide only narrowly defined statutory exceptions, each with its own conditions and approvals (for example a qualifying investment under rules set by law, or investment-promotion legislation). They are exceptional routes with their own requirements, not ordinary ways to buy a home, and this guide does not treat them as such.

A house or villa sits on land, so the question splits in two. The building itself can be owned by a foreigner, as a right separate from the land; the land under it is held by another route, most commonly a lease registered at the Land Office. Thai law caps a lease of immovable property at 30 years; a longer period is reduced to 30 years, and a renewal is a new registration at the time, not something an earlier promise can guarantee. A genuine Thai company that complies with Thai law can hold land or a house in its own name, but the property then belongs to the company: owning shares in a company is not personal ownership of its assets, and a company brings its own legal, accounting and tax obligations. It is not a shortcut to owning a home. Arrangements in which Thai nominees hold land, or the shares of a land-holding company, on a foreigner's behalf are prohibited under Thai law, and this guide does not recommend any structure; have any structure proposed to you assessed by your own lawyer before you rely on it.

The practical consequence for Phuket: most foreign buyers either own a condominium unit freehold within the quota, or lease the land under a villa they own. See the condos for sale in Phuket and the villas for sale in Phuket with this in mind.

Every registered condominium keeps a running tally of the floor area held by foreigners. While the foreign-owned share of the condominium is below 49 per cent, a unit can be transferred to a foreign buyer freehold; once the quota is full, further units can be sold to foreigners only on a lease. Developers usually sell their foreign-quota units first, which is why a listing says "foreign quota available" or "Thai quota". When you buy, the condominium's juristic person issues a letter confirming the foreign proportion, which the Department of Lands requires for the transfer.

To register a unit in a foreigner's name, the buyer must qualify under one of the eligibility routes set out in the Condominium Act. The ordinary route for a buyer living abroad is to bring the funds into Thailand in foreign currency, and the evidence normally has to cover at least the purchase price. For a transfer equivalent to USD 50,000 or more, the receiving Thai bank generally issues a Foreign Exchange Transaction Form (FET form); for a smaller transfer, the bank may provide other evidence of the foreign-currency inflow, such as a bank letter or credit advice, and whether it is sufficient depends on what the receiving Thai bank issues and the Land Office accepts. Ask your bank before sending anything which document it will issue for your amount and how the transfer should be described, and keep the evidence for the Land Office. Buyers with Thai permanent residence, and some other categories named in the Act, qualify on a different basis and do not follow exactly the same procedure; your lawyer will tell you which route applies to you.

Before reserving a condo, ask three things in writing: whether the unit is in the foreign quota, what the common-area fee per square metre and the sinking-fund contribution are, and whether the juristic person has outstanding debts or disputes. The condos and penthouses pages explain what the current listings look like.

A villa purchase by a foreign buyer usually involves two separate rights: a lease of the land, and ownership of the house that stands on it. The lease is registered at the Land Office against the land's title deed. Ownership of the house is a separate matter: it must be established and documented in its own right (your lawyer checks which documents prove it for the specific house) and registered at the Land Office where the law requires it. A house registration book (tabien baan, the "blue book") records who lives at an address; on its own it does not prove who owns the building. A lease of more than three years must be in writing and registered to be enforceable beyond three years, and 30 years is the maximum term; whatever a brochure says about "30 + 30 + 30", only the registered term is certain, future renewals are not guaranteed, whatever the developer's reputation, and a promise of them made today should be treated with caution rather than relied on. Your lawyer reads the lease for its term, renewal wording, assignment and inheritance clauses, and what happens if the landowner sells, and checks how ownership of the house is evidenced.

Villas in Phuket are mostly in gated estates with their own rules, security and shared facilities, so there are estate fees on top of the price and, in some projects, rental-management arrangements if you intend to let the house. Ask for the estate regulations and the current fee schedule before you commit. Our villas page and the area pages, for example Bang Tao and Laguna, describe the estates we currently list.

As a rule a foreign buyer does not own land in Phuket in their own name, and the statutory exceptions are narrow and conditional. Land is still relevant to foreign buyers mainly when leasing a plot and building a villa on it, with the lease registered and ownership of the house established in your name; any other route, including ownership through a genuine Thai company, needs independent legal advice and is not a shortcut. These are decisions to take with a lawyer, not an agent. What we can do is show you the plots currently for sale, explain the title deed each one carries and introduce you to the seller.

Reservation. Once you have chosen a property, the seller or developer asks for a reservation agreement and a deposit that takes the property off the market for an agreed period while the checks are done. Read what the deposit is conditional on and when it is refundable before paying it.

Due diligence. Your lawyer checks the title deed at the Land Office (the type of title, the registered owner, mortgages, leases, servitudes and other registered rights and encumbrances), legal access from a public road, the zoning and land-use rules that apply to the plot, the building permit and, where the project requires them, the environmental approvals; for a condominium, the building's registration under the Condominium Act, confirmation that the unit can be transferred within the foreign quota and the juristic person's debt-free certificate for the unit; for an off-plan project, the permits and registrations it needs (which differ between a condominium and a villa estate) and checks on the developer and the selling company, such as its registration, directors and any litigation; and the juristic person's accounts and any arrears. Independent legal review of these points is strongly recommended before you sign the sale and purchase agreement.

Sale and purchase agreement. The contract fixes the price, the payment schedule, who pays which fee at the Land Office, the handover date and what is included (furniture, appliances, parking). For a new build it also fixes the construction milestones and the remedies if they slip. We strongly recommend signing it only after your lawyer has reviewed it.

Payment. For a condominium bought freehold on the foreign-remittance route, funds covering at least the purchase price are sent from abroad in foreign currency as described above, in time for the bank to issue the FET form or other evidence the Land Office needs. Staged payments on an off-plan purchase follow the schedule in the contract; ask your lawyer how each instalment should be sent so that the total is evidenced at transfer.

Registration at the Land Office. The two main purchases are registered differently. For a condominium unit, ownership is transferred and the unit's title deed is updated in the buyer's name. For a villa, the lease of the land is registered against the land's title deed, and the transfer of the house is documented and, where the law requires it, registered as a separate matter; the two do not necessarily follow the same procedure. Registration takes place at the provincial Land Office, attended by the parties or by a representative under a power of attorney, often your independent lawyer. The Land Office has its own power-of-attorney form and documentary requirements, and a power of attorney signed outside Thailand may need to be notarised and certified, for example by a Thai embassy or consulate, before it is accepted. The fees and taxes due are paid at registration, and the updated documents are normally issued the same day.

Handover. Keys, utility meters, the furniture inventory, the juristic person's records and the estate or building registration are transferred to you. Keep every receipt and document from the purchase: they matter when you sell.

Where Planetarium comes in. We shortlist properties against your budget, areas and how you plan to use the property; we show them in person in Phuket or by live video if you are not yet on the island; and we coordinate the communication and documents between you, your lawyer and the seller or developer through to handover. The legal checks and the registration are your lawyer's work; we work alongside, not instead.

The amounts due at the Land Office are set by Thai law and by the appraised value the Land Office assigns to the property, so the figures change and depend on the property; ask for a written estimate for your specific purchase. The types to budget for are these.

Registration (transfer) fee, charged on the Land Office's appraised value under the ministerial regulations issued under the Land Code and the Condominium Act. Specific business tax, due from the seller when a property is sold in the course of business or within a few years of being acquired, under the Revenue Code and its royal decree; when it does not apply, stamp duty is charged on the transfer instead, so the two never both apply. Withholding tax on the seller's income from the sale, collected by the Land Office at registration. For a land lease, the registration fee and stamp duty on the lease, charged on the lease value rather than on a transfer. For a condominium, the sinking-fund contribution on transfer and the common-area fees from then on; for a villa, the estate fees. Your lawyer's fee, and any agency fee stated in your agreement. This guide deliberately gives no rates: they depend on the appraised value, the type of transaction and the seller's position, and temporary fee reductions are sometimes introduced for certain residential purchases, with conditions on the property, its price and the buyer that may not apply to you. Your lawyer can tell you which rates and concessions apply on your transfer date.

Tax law determines who is liable for some of these items: specific business tax or stamp duty, and the withholding tax on the sale, are generally the seller's liability. The sale and purchase agreement can still allocate the economic cost differently, for example by sharing the transfer fee or by the buyer bearing an amount the seller is liable for; that is a matter of negotiation, not custom, and such an agreement does not change who is liable to the tax authority. Ask for the allocation of every fee and tax in writing before you sign, and treat nothing as settled until it is in the contract. For a new build, the developer's payment schedule and any installment plan are part of the same conversation.

A completed resale can be inspected as it is, its juristic person or estate has a track record, and the transfer can happen as soon as the checks are done. The questions are the condition of the building, the fees and any arrears, and exactly what is included in the sale.

A new build or an off-plan project still under construction offers current design and a payment schedule spread over the build, against the risks of timing and delivery. The questions are the project's permits and the developer's track record, the construction and payment milestones in the contract, what happens if handover slips, and, for a condominium, whether the foreign quota is still available at the time of transfer, not only at reservation.

The west coast around Bang Tao and Laguna, Layan, Surin and Kamala has the largest choice of resort condominiums and pool-villa estates and the highest prices. Patong and Kata are the established beach towns of the south-west, with many sea-view units. Rawai and Nai Harn are the residential south, popular with long-stay residents, with villas and smaller condo projects at lower entry prices. Inland, Kathu and Phuket Town offer everyday living and value.

Prices move, so this guide gives none; every area and type page above shows the listings currently available with their asking prices, and the sale hub covers the whole island. If you are moving here to live rather than to invest, our guide to retiring in Phuket compares the areas and the home types day to day.

The rules above are summarised from Thai law and official information, which are authoritative in Thai: the Condominium Act B.E. 2522 (1979), in particular its provisions on foreign ownership and on evidence of funds brought into Thailand; the Land Code B.E. 2497 (1954) on the acquisition of land by foreigners and on nominee holdings; the Civil and Commercial Code on the hire of immovable property, including the three-year registration rule and the 30-year maximum; the Department of Lands' schedule of registration fees, taxes and duties; the Revenue Department on specific business tax and the Revenue Code provisions on withholding at registration; and the Thai government portal's page on foreigners requesting ownership of a condominium unit. English versions of Thai statutes are unofficial translations; where a translation and the Thai text differ, the Thai text applies. Checked on 29 October 2026.