Official price data covers one metro and one corridor. That is all.
The Real Estate Information Center, the property data body at the Government Housing Bank, is the closest thing Thailand has to an official house price authority. We read the full list of indices it publishes on 7 September 2026. Every residential and land price index it puts out covers Bangkok and vicinity or the Eastern Economic Corridor, and nothing else.
| REIC index | Area it covers |
|---|---|
| New housing project price index | Bangkok and vicinity |
| New condominium price index | Bangkok and vicinity |
| Vacant land price index | Bangkok and vicinity |
| Vacant land price index | EEC region |
| Residential price index | EEC provinces |
| Construction cost index for standard homes | A build cost, not a market price |
Read the right-hand column again and notice what is missing. There is no official price index for Chiang Mai. None for Phuket, Hua Hin, Khon Kaen, Udon Thani, Krabi or Chiang Rai. When a site tells you confidently whether to rent or buy in one of those places, it is working from portal listings — which are asking prices, not transactions, and are not the same thing.
The one figure we can print from REIC directly: the new condominium price index for units on sale in Bangkok and vicinity stood at 159.1 points in Q2 of B.E. 2568, up 1.4 per cent year on year. The base period is not stated on the page we could open and the detailed breakdown sits behind a member login, so we claim no base year and no per-province split.
And there is no official rent index for anywhere in Thailand
This is the half that makes the whole exercise hard, and we have not seen it stated anywhere else.
A rent-versus-buy comparison needs two numbers: what the place costs to buy, and what the same place costs to rent. The official record supplies the first for one metro and one corridor. It supplies the second nowhere — not for Chiang Mai, and not for Bangkok either. REIC’s published index set is prices, land and construction costs.
So any rent-to-price ratio you read for a Thai city has a rent number in it that came from somebody’s listing scrape. That does not make it useless. It makes it a listing scrape, and it should be labelled as one.
Our own data, labelled as ours: two units priced both ways
Rather than fill the gap above with someone else’s scrape, here is what we actually hold, counted live on 7 September 2026: 18 available listings site-wide — Bangkok 15, Chiang Mai 2, Chonburi 1. That is our inventory, not the Thai market, and we would rather show you eighteen real things than a made-up average.
Inside those eighteen there is something an index cannot give you. Two Bangkok units are each listed both for rent and for sale, and are paired to one another in our database as the same unit — same title, same floor, same size. An identical-unit rent-versus-buy pair is the cleanest comparison of the two options that exists, because nothing else varies.
| Unit (BAANLYY listings, 7 Sep 2026) | To rent | To buy | Gross yield | Gross years of rent to cover the price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 bed, 43 sqm, 2nd floor, Na Reva Charoennakhon, Bangkok | THB 30,000/month | THB 5,200,000 | 6.92% | 14.4 |
| 1 bed, 43 sqm, 15th floor, central Bangkok | THB 30,000/month | THB 5,300,000 | 6.79% | 14.7 |
Gross is the word doing the work. Out of that yield come the common area fee, contributions to the sinking fund, tax, any vacant months, furnishing, and the transfer costs in the next section. A net figure would be lower and we are not going to model one for you off two listings. And two units are two units — a pair, not a market.
What comes out of a gross yield in practice: sinking fund vs common area fee. Our current stock: residences, and the search across all of it in the finder.
The costs of buying are the same in every city. The base is not.
Here is the part that is official everywhere, and it is worth more than a made-up city average. These are the Department of Lands’ own published rates at registration.
| At the Land Office | Rate | Charged on |
|---|---|---|
| Transfer registration fee | 2% | The assessed value - not the price you agreed |
| Mortgage or preferential-right registration | 1%, capped at THB 200,000 | The mortgaged amount |
| Lease registration | 1% | The total lease value |
| Specific business tax (paid by the seller) | 3.3% | As set out by the Department of Lands |
| Stamp duty | THB 1 per THB 200 or fraction thereof | The receipt for the transfer |
| Withholding income tax | A formula, not a flat rate | The appraised value, varying with how the property was acquired and how long it was held |
Two things follow. First, the transfer fee is charged on the assessed value, which the Treasury Department publishes per location through its appraisal lookup. That assessed value is normally below an open-market price, so 2 per cent of what you are paying is an over-estimate of the fee rather than a useful one — look up the actual figure for the actual address. Second, for most Thai cities that appraisal value is the only official property number that exists at all, which makes it worth knowing how to find even if you are only renting.
We have not printed a baht figure for the transfer fee on the two units above, because we did not look up their assessed values, and inventing one would defeat the point of the paragraph you have just read.
The full cost stack, worked through: property transfer fees in Thailand and condo transfer costs. Whether you can hold it at all: what foreigners can own.
What renting costs you at the start, and what it does not
Renting has no Land Office bill, which is the whole of its cost advantage at the front end and is usually the only thing anyone mentions. Two things sit underneath it that are worth knowing before you compare.
The first is that residential building rental in Thailand is a contract-controlled business under consumer protection law, which caps what a landlord may take as deposit and advance rent rather than leaving it to negotiation. That sum is normally the largest cheque you write to start a tenancy, so knowing the cap is worth more than knowing an average rent.
The second is that a lease of more than three years has to be registered at the Land Office to be enforceable for its full term, and registration carries the 1 per cent fee in the table above. A long lease is therefore not a cost-free alternative to buying; it is a cheaper one with its own line item.
The deposit rules in full: security deposits in Thailand. If you will be letting it out yourself, rental income is category 5 assessable income with a 30 per cent standard deduction for buildings — and whether Thailand taxes you at all turns on the 180-day residence test.
City by city: what you can actually know
No winner, and no invented averages. This is an honest map of where the ground is firm.
| City | Official price data | Official rent data | What you can do instead |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bangkok and vicinity | Yes - REIC new housing and new condominium price indices, plus vacant land | None | Use the REIC index for direction over time; use the Treasury appraisal lookup for a specific address |
| EEC (Chonburi, Rayong, Chachoengsao) | Yes - REIC residential price index and vacant land index for the EEC | None | Same, and check which municipality an address is actually in before comparing |
| Chiang Mai | None published | None | Treasury appraisal lookup for the address; treat any published average as a listing scrape |
| Phuket | None published | None | As above, and note the province has three districts with very different local rules |
| Hua Hin | None published | None | As above, and check whether the address is in Hua Hin or in Cha-Am, Phetchaburi |
| Everywhere else | None published | None | Treasury appraisal lookup, and ask the seller for the last registered transfer |
Places compared on what does differ: Chiang Mai vs Bangkok, Phuket vs Koh Samui, Hua Hin vs Pattaya, and the wider Thai city comparison.
Who each suits
The decision does not actually turn on a ratio, which is fortunate, because for most Thai cities nobody can calculate one honestly.
| Renting suits you if | Buying suits you if |
|---|---|
| You are in your first year or two and still choosing a city, let alone an area | You have lived in the specific area long enough to know its traffic, noise and flooding |
| Your visa route or your work could move you | You are settled on a route that supports staying, and the unit qualifies for foreign ownership |
| You want the option to leave without a sale, a transfer and a remittance out | You are comfortable that exit means a sale at the Land Office, on someone else's timetable |
| You would rather not carry the common area fee, sinking fund and maintenance | You want to control the space, and the ongoing costs are acceptable to you |
| You are in a city where no official price data exists and you dislike buying blind | You will look up the assessed value and the building's own records before you commit |
The decision guide alongside this one: renting vs buying in Thailand, and the numbers version at rent vs buy.
Frequently asked questions
No, and this is the single most useful thing to know before you read anyone's answer. The Real Estate Information Center is the government's property data body, and every residential price index it publishes covers either Bangkok and vicinity or the Eastern Economic Corridor. New housing prices: Bangkok-metropolitan. New condominium prices: Bangkok-metropolitan. Vacant land: Bangkok-metropolitan and the EEC. Residential prices: the EEC provinces. There is no index for Chiang Mai, and none for Phuket, Hua Hin, Khon Kaen or Udon Thani either. Anyone giving you a rent-or-buy verdict for those cities is working from portal listings, which are asking prices rather than transactions.
Not one that we could find published anywhere, including for Bangkok. REIC's published index set is prices, land and construction costs. That matters more than it sounds: a rent-versus-buy comparison needs a rent number and a price number, and the official record supplies one of them, for one metro. This is why we publish our own listing data on this page and label it as ours rather than dressing it up as market data.
The rates do not change by city. The Department of Lands publishes them: the transfer registration fee is 2 per cent, the mortgage or preferential-right registration fee is 1 per cent capped at THB 200,000, lease registration is 1 per cent, specific business tax on the seller is 3.3 per cent, and stamp duty is THB 1 per THB 200 or fraction of the receipt. Withholding income tax is a formula on the appraised value that varies with how the property was acquired and how long it was held, which is why we describe it as a formula and do not give you a single rate. What does change by city is the base: the transfer fee is charged on the assessed value, not on what you agreed to pay.
It is the government's own appraisal of the land, building or condominium unit, published by the Treasury Department and looked up per location through its appraisal service. It is the number the 2 per cent transfer registration fee is calculated on. It is usually below an open-market price, so 2 per cent of your purchase price is an over-estimate of the fee rather than an accurate one, and we would rather tell you to look yours up than print an average. For most Thai cities it is the only official property number that exists at all.
We are not going to give you a market figure, because we do not have market data. We can give you something better in one narrow respect: on 7 September 2026 our own database held two Bangkok one-bedroom units of 43 square metres that were each listed both for rent and for sale, paired to each other as the same unit. One, on the second floor at Na Reva Charoennakhon, was THB 30,000 a month or THB 5,200,000. The other, on the fifteenth floor in central Bangkok, was THB 30,000 a month or THB 5,300,000. That is a gross yield of 6.92 and 6.79 per cent, or roughly 14.4 and 14.7 years of gross rent to cover the price. Gross is the word doing the work: common area fees, the sinking fund, tax, vacancy, furnishing and the transfer costs above all come out of it. And two units are two units, not a market.
For residential building rental, which is a contract-controlled business, the deposit and the advance rent a landlord may take are capped rather than left to negotiation, and the cap is a Thai consumer-protection rule rather than a local custom. We keep the detail on a page of its own so there is one place for it to be correct. Read the deposit rules before you sign, because the money in question is usually larger than the first month's rent.
Start from the address, not the average.
For most Thai cities the only official number is the appraisal value of a specific plot or unit. Pick the area first, then check what that address is actually assessed at.
General information only, not legal, tax or investment advice. BAANLYY LLC is a Nevada company and a listing portal: it does not own, lease, manage or control any property listed on this site and is not a party to any lease or sale. Listing figures on this page are BAANLYY’s own available stock as at 7 September 2026 and are not a market survey. Fees, appraisal values and index figures change; confirm anything you intend to act on with the Land Office, the Treasury Department and the Revenue Department. BAANLYY never takes paid placement in editorial content.
Sources
- Real Estate Information Center — the residential and land price indices it publishes, by coverage area ↗Real Estate Information Center (REIC), Government Housing Bank, Thailand · Accessed 7 September 2026
- ดัชนีราคาห้องชุดใหม่ที่อยู่ระหว่างการขาย ไตรมาส 2 ปี 2568 กรุงเทพฯ-ปริมณฑล (new condominium price index, Q2 B.E. 2568, Bangkok and vicinity) ↗Real Estate Information Center (REIC), Government Housing Bank, Thailand · Accessed 7 September 2026
- Real Estate Information Center (REIC), Government Housing Bank, Thailand ↗
- ค่าธรรมเนียม ภาษี และอากร (Fees, taxes and duties on land registration) — Department of Lands ↗Department of Lands, Ministry of Interior · Accessed 7 September 2026
- Department of Lands, Thailand ↗Department of Lands, Ministry of Interior · Accessed 19 August 2026
- Land and building appraisal-value lookup — Department of Lands & Treasury Department ↗Department of Lands and Treasury Department, Kingdom of Thailand · Accessed 6 September 2026
- Personal Income Tax — The Revenue Department ↗The Revenue Department, Kingdom of Thailand · Accessed 19 August 2026
- Contract Committee Notification: residential building leasing as a contract-controlled business, B.E. 2568 (gazetted 6 June 2025, in force 4 September 2025) — Office of the Consumer Protection Board ↗Office of the Consumer Protection Board, Kingdom of Thailand · Accessed 6 September 2026
Official primary sources are listed above with the date we last checked them. Thai rules, fees, thresholds and procedures change and can be applied differently by individual offices and embassies — confirm the current requirement with the responsible authority before relying on it. General information only, not legal, tax or medical advice. BAANLYY never takes paid placement in editorial content.