Find the right Chiang Mai real estate agent

Guides for Chiang Mai

• Selling

  Why Your Property Isn’t Selling in Thailand

  Six reasons a Thai listing stalls, and how to work out which one is yours before you drop the price again.

• Buying

  How to Buy a Condo in Thailand

  What to look at, what to check, what the deposit protects, and what actually happens at the Land Office.

• Selling

  Exclusive vs Open Listings in Thailand

  Open listings look safer and often are not. The difference is who owns the outcome of your sale.

Areas in Chiang Mai

Pick the neighbourhood you are buying or selling in and see who works it.

• Nimman
• Old City
• Chang Phueak
• Hang Dong
• Santitham
• Wat Ket
• San Sai
• Saraphi

Selling or buying in Chiang Mai: common questions

• Which parts of Chiang Mai are most active?+

  Nimmanhaemin and the streets around the university carry most of the condominium demand, and the Old City and Santitham sit close behind on the strength of walkability. Beyond the ring roads, Hang Dong, San Kamphaeng, Mae Rim, San Sai and Doi Saket are where the houses and land plots are, and where families and long-stay residents tend to settle.

• Is this a house market rather than a condominium one?+

  Largely, and that is the main way it differs from the coastal regions. Outside a handful of central pockets, the typical purchase is a house on its own titled land in an estate or a garden plot, which for a foreign buyer means a lease or a Thai company rather than freehold. Get that structure advised on by a lawyer before, not after, you agree terms.

• Does the dry-season smoke affect the market?+

  It is a real factor and worth discussing openly. Agricultural burning across the wider region degrades air quality in the northern valleys for part of the dry season, which shapes when long-stay residents are here and when they leave. Readings are published by the Pollution Control Department; check their figures for the months you care about rather than accepting anyone’s reassurance.

• Who is actually buying in Chiang Mai?+

  The pool is more domestic than on the coasts. Thai families from the north and from Bangkok, retirees on long-stay visas, remote workers and parents choosing one of the international schools out towards Hang Dong and Mae Rim all feature. Because so much demand is Thai-language, an agent without genuine Thai-speaking reach is only working half of the market.

• What should I ask before instructing someone here?+

  Ask to see the title document for your own property and check the agent can read it back to you correctly, because land here comes under several title types and they are not equivalent. Ask which estates and villages they have sold in, and whether they market in Thai as well as English. Then ask who valued the property and on what basis.