Its a condo play only unless your a local national. I have the desire to purchase a 2 bed room condo in either location because it is my goal to have a few home bases in the region for future early retirement. Its not a safe bet for decent ROI, mostly speculative in some opinion. I HAVE NOT purchased anything yet just research.
These days I’m also considering investing in Manila, can someone here help me? Tell me sth about Manila’s market, thanks
I read that in Thailand foreign born folks aren’t allowed to own land by national law.
I've heard the same thing from multiple foreigners who live there.
Be careful.....I don't know anything about Philippines, but in Thailand others are right on. Foreigners can't own land. Some people think they have a way around it, for example buying in a company name. My thought is don't play games with your retirement money. Every now and again someone will get pissed and decide to end this game of foreigners buying through companies, declare them all illegal and confiscate the properties.
You can buy in a condo in a foreign name....there are restrictions. Foreigners can't own more than 1/2 the building and of course plenty of other rules.
There is a company called New Nordic that mostly built condo type hotels south of Pattaya and now in Samui and Phuket. They can guarantee returns, rent your place out like a hotel room, so you can stay too when you want to go. There is tax on rentals now, so you want to check that out. Just recently enacted.
One logistic you have to think about is how do you use your place for vacations if you have it rented out? Unless you only use it for short term rentals.
Last April, when I had the idea to buy a condo in Manila, I began to check the market, also luckily I went to visit this country last July,2017, I had a good impression on this country, first, English is widely used and spoken, so no any language barrier, even I'm Chinese, I can speak fluent English, so I like this place; second, manila is developing very fast and rental fee is high compared with other countries, I have invested two condos in Thailand in the past, now the price is a little up, so I prefer to invest one in Manila; third, zero downpayment, so really convenient and good news for me, because I'm still paying for Pattaya condo, so I just paid 20000pesos for reservations, then assigned the contract and began to pay the first downpayment 30% of the total monthly, is only about 19000 pesos monthly, finally the price in Manila is still low compared to other countries, esp compared to cities in china, so once I made a decision, I took an action, I believe my choice is a good one, can we discuss here if u have some more advice? thanks for reading my words here!
About condo in Thailand, I wanna say sth here, because I have bought one condo in Bangkok in 2014, right on owning land, just a condo u can buy, but what does that matter? Maybe I'm Chinese, I can buy any apartment, but seldom own the land unless u are very rich and can afford a villa or living in the countryside, so just finished paying for the condo, u can rent it out to get some cash flow, for example, about 6% returns from your property every year, u can rent it out yearly, or if u come to Thailand for holidays, u can arrange your condo well, it depends on u, or on the other hand, u can live in hotel with ur money from rental fee, also a good option, anyway, buying a condo in Thailand or other countries is just a kind of investment, which can bring u profit, is not good enough? after all I missed the golden time to invest in china, so I don't wanna miss the gold time invested in Thailand or Philippines! Every chance will be passing by quickly when u are just waiting there and see!
oh, thanks for Yen Padilla, I am the same as u, I bought it this year, just paid 20000 pesos for reservations, then 5 years for downpayment monthly will be turnover in 2023, I asked DMCI company for help, also very reliable, now an agent directly from this company helped me, for others, I'm a little risk, but I think Manila is a good market to invest!
I've been thinking about investments in Southeast Asia as well. I've been in Shanghai for 15 years and like @Ping Zhang, I feel like I missed the boat on investing in China. I think the biggest question you have to ask is 'what is your investment goal'? Malaysia is supposedly the most affordable lifestyle country to live in Southeast Asia, so for retirement it might work great, but i'm hearing other locations in Thailand and Philippines bring greater returns. Don't forget the other countries not yet mentioned... I also know people in Myanmar and Vietnam who are quite happy with their investments, but they are in no hurry to build a real estate empire. Again, what's your goal?
Keep in mind, however, we are only talking SouthEast Asia, which tends to have investments good on annual appreciation but so-so on Cap rates, rental yields, and cash on cash returns. Compared to the US, the rental and overall Cash on Cash ROI are proving much better in the states. I have two triplexes currently both at 10%+ caprate and 12%-16% cash on cash ROI, with 20% down @ 5.75% loan rate. I haven't found this anywhere in Asia yet. Then again, I'm looking at numbers only.
Having traveled to both countries I would stay away from Philippines but consider owning in Thailand. But not for an investment, just as a place to spend time in (few months a year). There is a large difference in the two countries. While corruption exists everywhere, the PI seems particularly lawless. There was actually cases of Airport officials putting bullets in foreigners luggage and then shaking them down. This kind of stuff doesnt happen in Thailand because they depend so much on tourism and are trying to encourage westerners to retire there. For investing only, stick to the US. It has the best investment climate of anywhere when you think of the risk/reward ratio.
People here in Biggerpocket are most from USA and also do business only in USA, so when I first found this one, I felt a little disappointed, no investment in southeast asians? anyway I began this topic: " Invest in Thailand or in Philippines?" now I'm happy some people involve in this topic, I don't know anything about real estate in USA, a little far for me, I haven't visited it also, difficult to get a visa, also not cheap for me to visit this country, so I put my point in southeast countries, after visiting these countries, I compared with Chinese real estate, now in china, esp some big cities such as Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou , Shenzhen etc, very expensive to invest, so when I found the market in southeast countries cheaper than in china, thats why, I began to invest one in Bangkok in 2014, after I got my condo in 2015, I bought the furniture package, I rent it out every year, I found a good profit, about 6 percent returns, another one in Pattaya for holidays, still not finished, anyway compared Thailand and Philippines, all have advantages and disadvantages, just depend on u, now the price in Bangkok is a little high, if only investing, I think Manila is better than bangkok, more return in rental!
I recommend stating away from investing in a foreign country if your sole purpose is for Investment. We got burned with our Investments in India due to the Foreign Exchange Rates.
Most emerging economies are high inflation which means that the currency depreciates over time.
When its time for you to bring back your investments back to the US, you will realize that you probably haven't made any gains as the gains were probably wiped off as the US $ is stronger than the currency of the Emerging country. And then you also have to consider tax implications of moving money from one country to another.
Last year I went to visit Cebu, the second biggest city in phillipines, smaller than manila, in my mind, if u wanna invest first, then live in it later for holidays, I still advice Manila first, big city, big market and will be easily rented out and sell it later!
Followup to my Thailand visit. Unless you''re able to buy early in the first release stages of a new development, the equity is difficult to capture. Of course the first releases have the lowest prices to attract buyers. You can make some equity if you sell around the time just before the last units are sold out. But once the unit is a few years old, it loses much equity because the selling hype and interest have disappated and the next new development is getting attention. Even RE agents rarely show resale units. The developers give 15%-18% commission on their new units, while the REA may only get 5% on a privately owned resale unit. So older units depreciate and sit on the market much longer because REA simply dont want to waste their time showing buyers.
Not yet, I just bought in 2018 and now pay monthly, it will be finished in 2013 and 2014, I can get some profit with rising price each year when finial payment comes, then I can rent it out! Thanks