While enjoying the warm weather of Thailand, among the least of your priorities as an expat-retiree is hiring the services of a law firm. This is understandable because your primary aim is to enjoy and make use of your stay in Thailand’s top tourist and expat drawing southern Thailand rather than worrying on legal matters that may even spoil your plans.
However, in reality, you can never help it not because of a Thai law mandates you but your future transactions will eventually require you to hire one.
If you opt to rent or acquire a villa as your place to stay while in Thailand, you will really need to enlist the services of a law firm.
You have to make sure that what you are buying is free from any legal problems by doing Thai Due Diligence and ThaiTitle Search. Through these process, you will know for certain whether the documentations are in place and authentic and that the person who is trying to sell you the property is the actual owner or the legally authorized representative of the real owner of the property.
If you are also going to rent especially if you are looking forward for a long term stay on the said place, you can also make use of both Thai Due Diligence and Thai Title Search to provide you with a piece of mind as the thought of being ordered to vacate the place you have on a long term lease is as dreadful as it can be.
A law firm can do both for you and it can do them quite extensively considering that it has the edge especially on accessing legal documents and records. It has the capacity to dig deeper regarding a property or its owner’s background by research court records, an action of which only Thai-registered lawyers are allowed to do so.
You may have grown to love Thailand the more you explore it and thinking about the expiry date of your Non-Immigrant "O-A" Visa can worry you that much.
The Thai immigration laws and procedures can be very confusing for expatriates like you. Also, having all the required documents does not guarantee you and approval for your re-application or extension of stay as a retiree in Thailand.
Therefore, if you have a law firm in Thailand to assist you, the burden will be considerably lessened.
Your unfamiliarity with the Thai language, laws and procedures makes you vulnerable to certain deals not because the people you are dealing with are actively aiming to shortchange you but because you lack the knowledge of these.
Your law firm will be your vanguard when it comes to contracts. It will be the one which will review the proposed contract, interpret legal terminologies and the official language used, propose amendments if necessary to protect your interests and ensure that your rights as a foreigner-retiree are respected and intact.