Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing leases here in Thailand, specifically, well the state of play with leasing. What are we talking about? 

Well specifically going back now about a week, 10 days, maybe 2 weeks ago, we were talking about a recent Thai Supreme Court case that came down and abrogated the notion of what was referred to as 30 + 30 + 30 leasing. Now the way that this worked was they would put in these sort of "automatic extension" clauses in leases. And the clause itself is a different animal than the lease duration, which lease duration is set by the Civil and Commercial Code here in Thailand. It maxes out at 30 years that you can do a lease registered here in Thailand as a foreigner. But then you would see these lease contracts that would also have a provision in them that would say 'but it is automatic'. We will automatically renew it at this date. Now this was viewed as two different legal theories for a while. They were sort of like well this agreement regards a later thing that will happen; it is its own analysis, and then there is the 30-year leasing rule. Thai Supreme Court came in and said, 'no, you are using this to abrogate the public policy behind the 30-year rule to begin with' and basically said we are not going to allow that anymore. 

So where does that leave things in Thailand with regard to leasing? One, it puts you back to 30 years, so there is no automatic extension. Anytime anybody talks about that, you need to view that with extreme caution. But that said, 30 years registered, that's one way to go. Another thing folks don't think about, especially from certain Common Law jurisdictions, is what's called a usufruct. Sometimes, I believe the Europeans call it 'usafrict' translation, usafruct, 'usafrict', whatever, we are talking about lifetime usage. It's kind of akin to a life estate if you will in the American vernacular. That also remains an option for folks here in Thailand. Now again usufructs are a little bit trickier to deal with. Some Land Offices, they can be difficult at times; again it all depends on the underlying facts in the given case. But that being said, there are multiple options notwithstanding the fact that automatic renewal of 30-year leases is now gone. There are also multiple other kinds of benefits one could avail oneself of most notably condos. One can buy condos here in Thailand but as far as time duration property ownership, you are not going to be looking at anything to the best of my knowledge over 30 years in terms of leasing unless we see a major change to the laws here in the Kingdom of Thailand.