Retiring to Thailand in - True Life Stories
Well have you ever seen something, heard something or read something that just ticked you off and you wanted to do something about it?
I have. This is why you see this new page.
Visiting a Thailand website I was surprised to read the comments from members of their forum. The individual asked for opinions on our website. Fair enough and I think I know why he was asking. But to my amazement the opinions expressed by so called members to the forum should be copied here and examined in detail.
One person did not believe that someone could live on 550 baht a month. Well I agree wholeheartedly. We have never said that. We have detailed how someone can live here comfortably on $550 US a month (not baht) and shown our calculations on our Cost of Living Page.
To-date no one has questioned the accuracy of our living calculations.
Another person said that people do not need tour guides and that people coming here can do it on their own.
Well I disagree. Whatever you want to do on your own here will cost you more money. Some things here in Chiang Mai are cheaper and considerably so but not gas and car rental and the tour guides do not work for peanuts.
Another member of the forums said that our tour operator was showing tours with glitzy, fancy accommodations.
Well we have to correct this person also. Our group tour operator's recommended accommodations are good 3 star hotels. As their tours start in the morning and run until late evening they feel that your money is better spent on items other than hotel. So to offer the lowest cost possible to their tour members for the tours and yet provide comfortable accommodations they have decided that a good 3 star hotel should keep the majority happy. Never can keep everyone happy no matter how hard you try.
Of course if you want 4 star or 5 star hotel accommodations or even a villa with or without pool we have that also. And we have booked these as well for our clients.
So after reading about 6 of the inaccurate postings I am displeased. I visit forums infrequently but find them useful and informative. Not so in this case.
Moving on to this new topic you may find the "True Life Experiences" of some of our website visitors amusing, educational, and enlightening. I never mention names of our clients or visitors unless expressly authorized by the person to do so.
People coming here to Thailand to retire do it on their on in most cases. With so much information available on the internet they feel they have the situation well at hand and do not want to pay for some service they can do on their own.
Just over the past month this is what we have witnessed.
Val came here and booked accommodations on her own by viewing photo's supplied on the internet. Looked good, price was ok so she booked. Now she has come to us. Why?
The photo's were dated and the accommodations were not as described. She is not satisfied and has moved out and needs new accommodations quickly.
When we recommend accommodations to our clients we have in the majority cases been there, lived there or have photo's that are current.
Some hotels have photo's that are more than 10 years old and the accommodations and not nearly as clean, and livable and one would expect from the photo's. Are we surprised at this? NO..
Peter contacted us and also asked us to help him secure longer term accommodations in Chiang Mai. We told Peter that we will find him nice accommodations but we cannot book all condo's months in advance.
The condo's we manage.. Yes we can book for our clients months in advance. But condo's we do not manage it is very difficult to do and this is why.
If a condo is available now it will likely not be available 4 months from now. If a condo has a tenant supposedly moving out in 3 months he/she could change their mind and extend their stay.
Tenants notify the landlord within 30 days of their intent to stay or extend. So we have to wait until then until we know what will be available. Fair Enough?
Peter did not want to wait. His office booked accommodations for him. When he arrived low and behold his accommodations had gone to someone else. Wow, what a surprise. Folks, this happens here. So Peter contacted us AGAIN and asked for help.
Another gentleman wanted to go on one of our tours. Did he book accommodations with us? No, he left it up to his secretary. Well she booked him into a new hotel which offered a discount. Sounds good eh? Well, the hotel was so new that internet was not working and this was critical to this gentleman and for the one day he was there, no hot water. So he checked out promptly the following day. Once again we get a last minute request for HELP!!
We know what to expect here and we perform a valuable service. For us to search out the best accommodations for our clients is not easy. We try to provide photo's and visit each property before the client arrives. Then we have to send the photo's and let the client decide which property they prefer.
Do your research before you put in requests. This is not the Dominican Republic. This is a very busy time of year and many accommodations (the better ones) are booked solid. So if you think you can get accommodations for nothing then let me know and I will pay you to help us out. Deal?
My tone is not good because we work hard to provide our service. If our sevices did not meet client expectations we either refund some, all of our fee and we try to make it up to the client.
Many requests come in to us that it is hard to devote the attention that we do to each request. Emails back and forth, research, phone calls, gas expenses, computer costs and more.. And then we get people like Peter, and others who find out on their own what can and does happen. Are we trying to scare you? NO, we are trying to enlighten you, to educate you so you will know what to watch out for.
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Mr. T. wanted HS 4 accommodations. We suggested and recommended other accommodations for a lower price, in a great locations and friendlier service. No, it had to be HS 4. Well after 1 month there Mr. T. has changed his tune and wants out.
Mr. D. From Canada came to us for accommodations for only 11 days. We worked out butts off to try to get him a condo that is absolutely gorgeous. We thought we could get it for 1k baht a night but our cost was 1400 baht nightly. Nothing we could do. So we had an idea how we could offer it tour Mr. D. for 1100 night if he was just patient and gave us a little bit of time. NO, he booked elsewhere. The condo had a balcony, new everything, kitchenette, swimming pool, microwave and more. Sorry Mr. D. we tried and sometimes it does not work but it would have been easy for us to find you accommodations with 1-2 weeks left before you arrive.
A lady form Australia asked for our help in securing accommodations for the family and pet CAT. Not easy to do. We made a personnel request to the owner of a very nice serviced apartment and they said. YES, and only for us. We contacted the lady to let her know we have accommodations that are affordable, in a great location and that will accept the pet cat and we find out that she has booked accommodations out of town at double the rate she could have paid here in town close to evreything. When she wanted help she had the time to send us emails at will but when she booked she did not have the courtesy to let us know.
So that is part of what we have to put up with. But if you check back to this page we will update you with good and bad things that are happening and what you should watch out for if you are vacationing here or retiring here.
Ladies and gentlemen, we wish you all the best of vacations and retirement in Chiang Mai. It is a fantastic city that is affordable with many things to do for everyone. If you want to come here and do everything yourself fine.
For people who want us to help we will and we feel that our services will save you money and enable you to see more and do more.
If anyone is interested in what is happening in Thailand and in Chiang Mai then just send us an email and we will add you to our email list. When something happens here that is relevant to foreigners living here or vacationing here we will do our best to alert and notify you.
We regularly find or negotiate special deals for our clients like the New Hotel which had rates of $10 US a night. The hotel has a restaurant, massage and internet on site, even has a swimming pool. Great value for that amount.
Recently we added condo's to our Accommodations and we highly recommended these condo's because they were like new, in a good location and had everything from kitchenette, hot plate, minifridge, balcony and swimming pool. As soon as we posted our recommendation they were all booked up. They are still good values and we will recommend them to our clients when they next become available.
Each month we show a special that we located. In Oct. it was the "new" hotel with pool for only $10 U.S. a night. In January our special was 4 condo's that were priced well for rental and sale for someone wanted an executive condo or a luxury executive condo. No sooner had we posted them on our website they had tenants.
Stay tuned for our February special.
We know we can help people retire here and retire comfortably on only $550 U.S. a month. If you look at our Cost of Living page we detail our breakdown. In fact if you want to live here on only $300 U.S. a month we can show you how but it will not be living at the ritz but rather budget accommodations.
Since we have received many requests for executive accommodations we had to add them to our website. The requests for accommodations that we receive range from budget apartments to luxury villas. If you want a villa and private swimming pool and maid and butler and driver we can find it for you but you will not be living here for $550 U.S. a month.
Comfortable, affordable retirement is our specialty. Do I live in a villa? No. Do not even have a maid or butler. Do my own laundry and cleaning.
related pages..
CONDO's for Retire-on-550 clients.. No Joiner Fees, Larger & Better Equiped than Hotel
Short term rentals - Include "FREE" Wifi, breakfasts daily, cable tv, stocked fridge, 3x./week full cleaning
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