Buying property abroad from China: the checklist, in the order that decides it.

What order should a mainland buyer work in?

Funding route, ownership rule, building and unit, destination paperwork, exit. In that order, because each step can end the purchase and the earlier ones are cheaper to fail. Nothing gets signed until step one is answered in writing.

1. The funding route. Can the full amount lawfully reach the destination, in your own name, by the contract dates.
2. The ownership rule. What a foreigner may actually hold there, and on what title.
3. The building and the unit. Headroom, management, arrears, and whether the numbers survive contact with the costs.
4. The paperwork. What the destination requires from a foreign buyer on the day of registration.
5. The exit. What it costs to sell and what evidences taking the proceeds out.

Step one: is there a lawful funding route, confirmed in writing?

Start here. China's individual foreign exchange facility is an annual total amount equivalent to USD 50,000 per person per year, and SAFE's application form states the foreign exchange bought may not be used for overseas property purchase or other capital account items not yet open.

What that means for the sequence is simple: a licensed bank in China and a qualified adviser answer the funding question, on your own facts, before a property is chosen and long before a deposit moves. This site describes the published rules and does not set out routes around them.

The full version, with the rule text and the four questions to take to your bank: funding an overseas property purchase from China.

Step two: what can a foreigner actually own in the destination?

In Thailand, a condominium unit as registered freehold in your own name, under Section 19 of the Condominium Act, provided foreign holders in that building together stay within 49% of the area of all the units, the ceiling set by Section 19 bis.

Answer this before you look at listings, because it decides which listings are even eligible. A unit in a building with no headroom is not a cheaper version of the same purchase; it is a different transaction on a different title.

The rule and the arithmetic: Thailand foreign freehold, explained, and the provisions themselves: Section 19 of the Condominium Act. What this looks like for a buyer coming from the mainland specifically: Chinese buyers in Thailand's condominium market.

Step three: does this building and this unit survive the checks?

Ask the juristic person for a dated foreign quota letter, ask whether the unit is already registered to a foreign owner, and check the management, the sinking fund and the arrears before the price conversation. A building fails before a unit does.

• The quota letter, naming the building, with total saleable area, area registered to foreign owners, the percentage, a date and a signature. One at due diligence, a fresh one dated within seven days of closing.
• The unit's own register status, because a unit already on the foreign side does not consume new headroom when it changes hands between foreign owners.
• The management, the juristic person's accounts, and the debt-free certificate you will need at the Land Office.
• The evidence behind the numbers, which is rent that can be documented rather than quoted.

The document list: Thailand condo due diligence. Every listing in your budget ranked against the same checks: see the report, page by page.

Step four: what paperwork does the destination want from a foreign buyer?

In Thailand: evidence of foreign currency brought in of not less than the unit price, which is the receiving bank's FET form or, below USD 50,000 on a single transfer, a credit advice letter; the foreign quota letter; the Chanote; and the juristic person's debt-free certificate.

Section 19 ter puts the evidence duty on the transferee and a declaration of the existing foreign-owned proportion on the transferor. Section 19 quater is the official's verification of the ratio before registration. In other words, the Land Office tests the documents on the day, not the intentions.

The document that fails most often is the money evidence, because it depends on how the wire was sent: the FET certificate, explained.

Step five: what does the exit look like before you buy?

Price it at the start. A Thai sale carries Land Office transfer costs, a business tax or stamp duty depending on how long the unit was held, and withholding taken at the Land Office, and the money you brought in is what anchors taking proceeds back out.

The holding period changes which tax applies, so the exit cost is partly a decision you make on the way in. Keep the FET and the closing file: the evidence of what came in is what supports what goes out.

Step by step: selling a Thai condo as a foreigner. The annual side while you hold it: Thailand property tax for foreigners.

Header photo: Artem Kavalerov, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons. All credits: image credits.