Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing the LTR visa. It seems to be something of a hot topic at the moment because they have just come online, we have sort of seeing folks be able to look into this as a viable option. As I have said in many other videos, first of all understand LTR stands for Long-Term Residence Visa. It is kind of a misnomer, it is not a residence visa, it is just a really long visa. As we have also discussed, it is also called the 10-year Visa presently it looks like it's actually more like a 5 and 5 Visa; it is not really 10 years per se insofar as you apply for it and if you are approved, you have a 10-year visa. No they re-adjudicate over time. There is also the issue with respect to ongoing reporting to the Revenue Department here in Thailand which does not seem to be something that most folks are overly enthusiastic about.

But interesting, I found some observations coming off of various places rather interesting but most notably from Pattaya Mail, that is pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Pattaya's retirees unlikely to apply for a Golden Visa. Quoting directly: "But the LTR or long-term residence visas are also aimed at two groups of non-working foreigners, namely the wealthy global traveller (rich millionaires-plus with time on their hands) and retirees aged over 50 (assumed to have an income of at least US $80,000 per year and/or extra cash to invest). Pattaya Mail spoke to a group of retired farang who were renewing their one year extensions of stay, but they did not seem impressed by the latest option. "One stop shops and paying less Thai income tax aren't the top concerns of retirees or foreigners married to Thai women," said Dave Ellison who has lived in Pattaya for 10 years."

Yeah so there is a lot going on with this, as we have discussed before. Again 90-day reporting which no one, they say these things are exempt from 90-day reporting. No one has pointed to me the Law where that says that is the case. It's my understanding the Immigration Act of 1979 remains the Law in Thailand and if one is not truly a Permanent Resident of Thailand, which is its own process, then one is still covered under the Non-Immigrant sections of that Act and 90-day reporting is required under that Act. Setting that aside, I think for the vast majority of retirees, this may not be the greatest option. There are some folks out there who I do think this is likely to be something of a consideration for; they are probably going to be looking into this. That being said, thus far it looks to me like, it is going to depend on everybody's specific circumstances and I think it is a rather narrow subset of expats but I can see a subset of expats who may greatly benefit from this and who may be greatly interested in this. Long story short, it does appear that the vast majority of retirees here in Thailand are probably not going to be moving over to the so-called Long-Term Residence Visa anytime in the near future.