Stages of a Property Purchase in Thailand: From Reservation to Registration
Buying property in Thailand isn't a single moment of signing a contract — it's a sequence of steps spread over weeks. Here's what happens at each one, and where a skipped step tends to cost time or money.
Five steps from reservation to title in hand:
| Step | What happens | What comes out of it |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Reservation | A deposit takes the property off the market for an agreed period | Reservation agreement |
| 2. Due diligence | Checking the title, quota, encumbrances, and the seller's authority | Legal opinion |
| 3. Sale and purchase agreement (SPA) | Fixing the price, payment schedule, and tax split | Signed SPA |
| 4. Money transfer | Bringing in and converting currency through a legal channel | FET or Credit Advice |
| 5. Land Department registration | Checking the full package, paying the fees | Title in the buyer's name |
Step 1. Reserving the property
A deal usually starts with a reservation — the buyer puts down a small deposit that takes the property off the market for an agreed period, typically anywhere from a few days to a few weeks. A reservation agreement isn't the same as a sale and purchase agreement — it's normally a separate, shorter document, with a condition that the deposit is partly or fully refundable if due diligence in the next step turns up a problem with the title.
Before putting down even a small reservation deposit, it's worth confirming the seller or developer actually has the right to sell that specific unit — for instance, that the foreign ownership quota in a condominium isn't already used up.
Step 2. Due diligence
After the reservation — and before signing the main contract — comes due diligence: verifying the type of land document (a Chanote or something lower-ranked), confirming there are no mortgages or disputes attached to the property, checking the seller's authority to sell it, and, for a condominium, confirming the deal fits within the foreign quota. This check is normally handled by a lawyer independent of the developer and the seller.
Step 3. The sale and purchase agreement
If due diligence doesn't turn up any problems, the parties sign the main sale and purchase agreement (SPA). It fixes the price and currency of the deal, the payment schedule, how taxes and fees are split between the parties, and the terms for terminating the contract and liability if either side backs out.
Step 4. Transferring the money and preparing documents
After the SPA is signed comes the transfer of funds. The money for the purchase has to enter Thailand as foreign currency brought in through a legal channel — a bank transfer, a licensed currency exchange service, or, for smaller amounts, cash declared at the border. Once the transfer is complete, the bank issues a document confirming the currency was brought in and converted — an FET or a Credit Advice, depending on the transfer method. This is the document the Land Department will check at the next step as a condition for registering freehold title.
At the same time, it's worth confirming the final tax and fee total that will sit on top of the property's price.
Step 5. Registration at the Land Department
The final step is registering the transfer of ownership at the Land Department. According to the official description of the condominium registration procedure, it consists of a few sequential steps handled on-site:
At this step, the Land Department officer checks the whole package at once: the title document, the condominium juristic person's confirmation of the foreign quota, the FET or Credit Advice in the buyer's name, and payment of the applicable fees and taxes.
How long this actually takes
Timelines vary between developers and sellers enough that quoting a specific number of days without reference to a particular deal wouldn't be accurate. As a rule, due diligence takes longer than the registration itself: checking the title and the quota can stretch to one or two weeks, while the actual Land Department procedure on the appointed day takes a few hours. That's exactly why transferring the money and preparing the FET or Credit Advice is worth planning ahead rather than at the last minute before the registration date — it's the step where deals most often lose time to missing paperwork.
Step four is where EXFM comes in: converting a client's funds into baht and arranging the transfer so the full financial document package is ready well ahead of time, rather than pulled together at the last minute before the trip to the Land Department.
Further reading: the official description of the registration procedure on the thailand.go.th portal and on the official website of Thailand's Department of Lands — dol.go.th.
