Buying a condo in Thailand: the 49% foreign-quota rule explained

Foreigners can own a condominium unit in Thailand outright — full freehold title, registered in your own name at the Land Office. Condos are the one type of Thai real estate genuinely open to direct foreign ownership; land, by contrast, generally is not.

The catch is the foreign quota. Under Section 19 bis of the Condominium Act B.E. 2522 (1979), foreigners may together own no more than 49% of the floor area of any one condominium. Almost everything else about buying as a foreigner — the bank paperwork, the leasehold fallback, the scams — flows from that one rule. Here is how it works in practice, as of October 2026.

What the 49% quota actually measures

The quota is calculated on the saleable floor area of all units in the building, measured in square metres. Common areas — lobbies, corridors, the gym, the pool deck — are excluded. If a building has 10,000 sqm of unit space, up to 4,900 sqm of it can sit in foreign freehold names.

Because the quota is counted in square metres, not in units, the remaining quota may fit a 35 sqm studio but not the 120 sqm corner unit you actually want. Always ask for the remaining quota in square metres, never as a "number of foreign units left."

Two more details matter. The quota attaches to each registered condominium — in practice, each building registered under the Act — not to the developer or the wider project. And it is tested at the moment your transfer is registered at the Land Office, not when you sign. A building that had quota available at reservation can be full by transfer day, because the foreign/Thai split moves with every resale.

Who counts as an eligible foreign buyer

Section 19 of the Act lists five categories of foreigners who may own a unit within the quota:

• holders of a Thai permanent residence permit;
• foreigners admitted under Board of Investment (BOI) investment promotion;
• Thai-registered companies that count as foreign under the Land Code;
• foreign companies holding a BOI promotion certificate; and
• foreigners or foreign juristic persons who bring foreign currency into Thailand (or draw on a non-resident baht or foreign-currency account) to pay for the unit.

Almost every individual buyer uses the last route: you transfer the money from abroad and prove that you did. The proof is the FET form.

The FET form: proving your money came from abroad

Under Section 19 ter of the Act, you must show the Land Office evidence that foreign currency was remitted into Thailand; in practice, the Land Office checks that the amount is at least the purchase price of the unit being registered. Without it, the Land Office will refuse to register foreign freehold — there is no workaround on the day.

The evidence comes from your receiving Thai bank, which documents the foreign-exchange transaction. The type of document depends on the amount transferred: banks generally issue a Foreign Exchange Transaction (FET) form for each transfer of USD 50,000 or more (or the equivalent); for smaller transfers, you need to ask the bank for a credit advice or a confirmation letter instead. Land Offices accept these, so ask the bank before you remit which document you will receive, and keep it.

Three rules keep the paperwork clean:

• Right name. The FET form or credit note should clearly link the remitted funds to you, the buyer, and to the payment for the unit — normally by naming you as the sender or beneficiary. If someone else sends the money, or it comes through another account, check in advance which evidence the Land Office will accept.
• Right currency. As a rule, the money should arrive in foreign currency and be converted to baht inside Thailand, or be deposited into a foreign-currency account in Thailand and then withdrawn to pay the price. Sending baht directly from abroad usually means the bank cannot issue an FET document, unless it can confirm the money was drawn from a non-resident baht account. Paying in cash, or in baht from an ordinary account in Thailand, does not qualify.
• Right purpose. The stated purpose of the transfer should reference the condominium purchase — ideally naming the project and unit.

Freehold vs leasehold: what you are actually buying

Freehold means indefinite, registered ownership of the unit, plus an undivided share of the common property and a vote in the condominium juristic person — the legal body of co-owners that manages the building. You can sell, rent out, mortgage and leave the unit to your heirs. If an heir is a foreigner, however, the Condominium Act has specific rules for units acquired by inheritance: depending on whether the heir qualifies under Section 19 and on the building's foreign quota, the heir may have to notify the Land Office and dispose of the unit within a set period. Take advice on your heirs' position before you buy.

Leasehold is a registered right to use the unit for a fixed term. Under Section 540 of the Civil and Commercial Code, a lease of immovable property is capped at 30 years; if a longer term is agreed, it is reduced to 30 years. Under Section 538 of the Civil and Commercial Code, a lease longer than three years is only enforceable beyond year three if it is registered on the title deed at the Land Office; registration costs 1% of the total rent plus stamp duty of 0.1% of the total rent.

Be careful with "30+30+30" or "90-year" lease offers. In Decision No. 4655/2566, a 2023 ruling that drew wide attention when publicised in 2025, the Supreme Court held that a promise to renew the lease twice more, for 30 years each time, with the rent and conditions fixed in advance and the tenant having already paid for the renewal periods, was a way of circumventing Section 540 and was therefore void. The court also rejected the argument that the promise still bound the parties as a personal right. In practice, a renewal is a fresh agreement that the owner of the day may or may not sign. Price a leasehold as 30 years of use, not as near-ownership.

When the building's foreign quota is full

If the 49% quota is full, you cannot register foreign freehold in that building, full stop. The standard fallback developers offer is a 30-year registered leasehold on units in the Thai portion.

That can be a fair deal — at the right price. A leasehold unit should trade at a meaningful discount to an identical freehold unit, because what you are buying runs out. If a developer offers a quota-full unit at freehold pricing "because the lease is renewable," renegotiate or walk away.

And because the quota is a live number, have your lawyer re-verify it at the Land Office shortly before the transfer appointment — not only at reservation.

Due diligence before you pay any deposit

Most condo problems are visible before money changes hands, if someone actually looks. Before paying even a reservation deposit, check at minimum:

• Foreign-quota confirmation letter from the condominium juristic person, ideally cross-checked directly at the Land Office. The Land Office will not register foreign freehold without it.
• Title search of the unit's title deed: who really owns it, and are there mortgages, liens or other encumbrances registered against it?
• Debt-free letter ("bai plod nee") from the juristic person, confirming the seller owes no common-area fees. It is mandatory for transfer and must be a current certificate that meets the requirements of the relevant Land Office — check how recent it needs to be when you book the transfer.
• Developer checks for off-plan: track record of completed projects, environmental (EIA) approval, building-permit status, and whether the building will actually be registered under the Condominium Act at all.
• Juristic person health: accounts, sinking fund, fee arrears and bylaws. A beautiful building with a broke management body is a slow-motion problem.

This is the core of our due-diligence service for property buyers; our real-estate transactions team then handles the contract, the FET paperwork and the transfer itself.

Transfer day: taxes, fees and who pays

Registration happens at the Land Office and is completed in a single day. The standard charges, calculated mainly on the official appraised value, are:

• Transfer fee: 2% of the appraised value. Custom says buyer and seller split it 50/50, but that is pure negotiation — fix it in the contract.
• Specific business tax: 3.3% (including municipal surcharge) of the higher of the sale price or appraised value, if the seller has held the unit for less than five years. Individual sellers are exempt if their name has been on the unit's house registration for at least one year, or if they acquired the unit by inheritance. A developer, company or other seller in the property business may owe the tax whatever the holding period, because the sale is treated as commercial. Where specific business tax does not apply, stamp duty of 0.5% of the higher of the sale price or appraised value is payable instead. Legally the seller's cost, though contracts sometimes reallocate it.
• Withholding tax: 1% of the higher of the sale price or appraised value if the seller is a company; for an individual seller, a progressive personal-tax calculation on the appraised value with deductions based on years of ownership. Again, the seller's tax by law.

One trap for foreign buyers: the government stimulus that cuts the transfer and mortgage fees to 0.01% for homes up to THB 7 million (in force from 22 April 2025 and since extended to 30 June 2027) applies to Thai-national individual buyers only. As a foreign-quota buyer you pay full rates — budget roughly 1–2% of the price for your side of the fees, depending on what you negotiate.

From a signed sale-and-purchase agreement to registered transfer, a typical resale takes 30–90 days. The pacing items are your inbound FET remittance, the juristic person's quota and debt-free letters, and the release of any mortgage by the seller's bank.

Common scams and red flags

• The nominee company pitch. "Set up a Thai company with Thai shareholders we provide — everyone does it." Using Thai stand-in shareholders to hold property for a foreigner is a criminal offence under the Land Code and the Foreign Business Act B.E. 2542 (1999), and from late 2025 into 2026 the Department of Business Development and the Department of Special Investigation (DSI) have been actively investigating and unwinding these structures. See our separate articles on nominee property structures and buying property under a Thai company name.
• "Foreign freehold" in a full building. Some agents sell units as foreign freehold in buildings whose quota is already exhausted. You discover the problem at the Land Office — after paying.
• Fake or stale letters. Quota and debt-free letters that are forged, outdated or issued for a different unit. Check the issue dates and confirm directly with the juristic person and the Land Office.
• One-sided off-plan contracts. Clauses letting the developer downgrade specifications, change the unit size or delay handover for token penalties (sometimes 0.01% per day), while your deposit is forfeitable if you walk.
• "Condominiums" that never get registered. If a project is never registered under the Condominium Act, there is no foreign freehold to convey — buyers end up holding leases they thought were ownership.

These are the condo-specific traps. For the wider picture — land, villas and off-plan projects included — see our overview of the real risks for foreign real-estate investors in Thailand.

Is the quota going up to 75%? The real status in October 2026

You have probably seen headlines about Thailand raising the foreign condo quota to 75% and allowing 99-year leases. Here is the actual legal position as of October 2026: neither has happened.

In June 2024 the cabinet instructed the Interior Ministry to study raising the quota to up to 75% (with foreign voting rights still capped at 49%) and extending lease terms toward 99 years. That was an instruction to study — not a bill, and not a law. No amendment to the Condominium Act has passed Parliament; the 49% quota and the 30-year lease cap remain fully in force. If anything, the recent direction of travel has been toward tighter enforcement against illegal workarounds, not liberalisation.

There is precedent for change: a temporary amendment allowed up to 100% foreign ownership in certain Bangkok and municipal-area condominiums from 1999 — but it expired in April 2004 and was never revived. The practical advice is simple: buy on the law as it stands today, and never pay today's price for a rule that exists only in a press release.

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This article is general guidance — not legal or tax advice. If you'd like a scoped opinion on how it applies to your specific situation, contact our team.