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Land prices in Soi Thonglor (Sukhumvit 55) are expected to stay at least 20-30 per cent above the official evaluation price, currently set at Bt420,000 per square wah, which will further boost the value of new condominium projects, said a land developer.

The evaluation price is being used as the reference for transactions executed during 2016-2019.

Uthai Uthai-sangsuk, Sansiri’s executive vice president of business development and condominium development division, said that the actual prices of land near BTS station are as high as Bt1.3-Bt1.6 million per square wah.

“There is little land supply for project development, particularly in the middle of the soi,” he said. “This pushes up condominium reselling prices as well as rents. Renting out units are also a lucrative business for the wealthy Thais and foreign buyers particularly the Japanese,” he said.

The prices of condominium projects in the soi average at Bt161,000 per square metre. The projects located on the main road are asking for Bt250,000-Bt300,000 per square metre.

Sansiri has developed four condominium projects in the area, housing 1,300 altogether with market value of more than Bt12 billion. In 2010, its Bt1.6-billion project HQ Thonglor was sold out in a day. It plans two more projects with combined value of over Bt10 billion.

Source: The Nation

Tourism Authority of Thailand has been participating in the WTM since its inception in 1980. This year, the Thai contingent includes 48 exhibitors including high-quality hotels, health and wellness facilities, as well as world-class food and beverage outlets, which are embedded with giving a touch of Thainess and local experiences to their guests.

 

Moreover, the Ministry of Tourism and Sports working closely with the Ministry of Public Health, has launched a ‘Visit Thailand Enhance Your Healthy Life’ campaign for medical tourism, as well as joined hands with TAT to attend significant world medical trade events and roadshows.

 

In 2017, TAT aims to offer “Value for Experiences” to travellers coming to the Kingdom by focussing on “Unique Thai Local Experiences” to the world. In line with the Thailand 4.0 model, TAT will highlighting a value-based economy driven by innovation and looking to be a creative economy delivering creative tourism. TAT has also initiated the LINK project in which ‘L’ represents Local Experiences; ‘I’ for Innovation; ‘N’ for Networking and ‘K’ for Keeping character. This is aimed to promote the local tourism in various communities in Thailand; such as, Ban Na Ton Chan Community in Sukhothai province, Kram Sakon in Sakon Nakhon province, Ban Nam Chiao Ecotourism Community, Trat province, and Ko Klang Community, Krabi province.

 

Mr. Yuthasak Supasorn, TAT Governor said, “Promoting the local experience will not only benefit visitors, but also the local people as well as travel agents. We strongly believe that each local community of Thailand can deliver distinctive, genuine, unique hospitality and Thai culture with new exciting experiences to tourists. Also, this will create new and unique quality products for travel agents to offer to their customers.”

From 1 January – 22 October, 2016, Thailand welcomed 26.4 million tourists, generating an income of 26.5 billion Pounds, up 11.82 percent and 15.59 percent, respectively. The top five tourism spending countries are China, Malaysia, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America.

At the end of 2016, TAT expects to reach 35 billion Pounds, an increase of 18 per cent based on a projection of 33 million international tourists.

Source:traveldailynews

Above: Many homeowners are taking the attitude that they will not be selling unless the price is good.

Home deals in the primary and secondary market are expected to drop further following DonaldTrump’s election victory, but it might not be all bad news, industry experts say.

The situation of Trump winning the American presidency is similar to Brexit, Centaline PropertyAgency founder Shih Wing-ching said yesterday, as the US Federal Reserve might delay raising interest rates – therefore prompting capital to continue flowing into the local and Asia property market.

Above: The situation of Trump winning the American presidency is similar to Brexit

Shih said the home market was already in a “wait-and-see” mode after introduction of the latest cooling measures last week, and he expects prices to fall 3 to 5 percent until starting to recover in the second quarter next year.

“Volatility in the market can be expected, and home deals in both the primary and secondary market will go down in the short term following the latest cooling measures and Trump’s presidency,” said Midland Realty chief analyst Buggle Lau Ka-fai.

“Performance of the local home market in the mid-to-long term will depend on expectations over the US interest rate, and whether Trump’s policies, such as levying taxes on Chinese exports, will affect the mainland’s economy,” Lau added.

However, Lau noted that an expectation of further yuan depreciation may lead to more capital outflow from the mainland into the SAR’s luxury home and commercial property markets.”Due to uncertainties and volatility in the global market, capital might flow towards risk-averse assets, and the property market will be one of those options,” said Knight Frank senior director, Thomas Lam Ho-man.

Above: US Federal Reserve might delay raising interest rates therefore prompting capital to continue flowing into the local and Asia property market.

Terence Chong Tai-leung, executive director of the Institute of Global Economics and Finance at Chinese University of Hong Kong, believes Trump will adopt a pragmatic approach once in office.

Chong said the major factor affecting the local market remains the latest cooling measures, which have caused secondary home deals to “freeze.”

“Many homeowners are taking the attitude that they will not be selling unless the price is good, and as a result, many are looking to rent out their flats instead,” said Centaline branch manager Buddy Ching.

Above: Republican candidate Donald Trump pulled off one of the most stunning upsets in US election history by trouncing market favorite Hillary Clinton to win the White House.

Source: The Standard

In one of the most shocking U.S. elections in modern political history, Donald Trump has defeated Hillary Clinton.

“I pledge to every citizen of our land that I will be president for all Americans,” Trump said in his victory speech after the Associated Press called the race for him at 2:30 am Wednesday morning. Striking a conciliatory tone, Trump continued, “For those who have chosen not to support me in the past, of which there were a few people, I’m reaching out to you for your guidance and your help so we can work together and unify our great country.”

He also said Hillary Clinton had called him to concede the race. “Hillary has worked very long and very hard over a long period of time, and we owe her a major debt of gratitude for her service to our country,” he said. “I mean that very sincerely.”Trump’s upset was one he had been predicting for months, gleefully comparing himself to the Brexit vote in England. Yet it was one that almost no other major predictors foresaw, all giving Clinton various degrees of comfortable leads in their election day predictions.

“It was Donald Trump versus almost all the experts … it looks like Donald Trump was right,” Jake Tapper said on CNN at 10:40 pm on election night (before major battleground states had been called).Trump, a reality television star and political neophyte, upended every rule in the book to clinch his victory. He bested 15 other candidates in the Republican primary, most of whom were governors and senators. “One of [Donald] Trump’s real sources of strength is not just that he took the fight to the elites in an abstract way, but that he was the one guy on a stage of 16 candidates who really seemed culturally disconnected from the other candidates,” J.D. Vance, author of Hillbilly Elegy, told TIME before the general election.

In the general election, Trump didn’t run his campaign in any sort of traditional way. He was outspent in campaign ads by Clinton by 3 to 1, and he had a small, disorganized ground game up against the Clinton election machine. TIME wrote two separate cover stories about the meltdowns and disarray inside the Trump campaign. Not to mention the candidate’s freewheeling, bombastic speaking style and penchant for engaging in Twitter fights with Gold Star families and former beauty pageant contestants.

But throughout his campaign, Trump openly flouted convention and touted his success in tapping into a populist vein in the country that no other candidates had been able to effectively access. “This is a movement,” Trump would tell his followers who showed up by the tens of thousands to see him speak. Many supported him from their anger and their sense that the country needs a big change, that the way government works is broken. In the final days of his campaign Trump began using the the slogan “drain the swamp” to talk about the nation’s capitol, which he said crowds loved.

Trump’s victory exposed real divisions and new fault lines in the American populace, as he was on track to win huge majorities of non-college educated whites, while winning less of college-educated whites, who are normally reliably Republican. The fight between the first female major party candidate and the man accused of sexually assaulting women also turned into a referendum on gender; “what women can be, and what men can get away with,” as TIME put it in the cover story the week before the election.

“There’s going to be a schism of some sort,” former Republican Gov. Bill Weld, who ran as the vice presidential candidate on the Libertarian ticket this election, told TIME before the election.

As president, Trump has promised he will build a wall along the border with Mexico, suspend the Syrian refugee resettlement program, repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act and renegotiate NAFTA. His election, coupled with Republican control of Congress, will also likely put a new conservative Supreme Court justice in the seat vacated by the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

Conventional wisdom said everything from demographics to campaign infrastructure would keep Donald Trump from ever reaching the White House and making good on these goals. But Trump told his followers not to believe the polls showing him down and promised the pundits that there were secret Trump voters out there. “100%” his campaign manager Kellyanne Conway tweeted early Wednesday morning before the election was called, in response to a Washington Post writer tweeting, “There was a silent Trump vote. A big one.”

It turns out Trump was right.

Source: Time 

With an aim to boost medical tourism in Thailand, a seminar was held at the Hormuz Grand Hotel recently.

Organised by the Tourism Authority of Thailand in cooperation with the Thai Embassy in Muscat, the seminar was titled, ‘Seminar for Promoting Medical Tourism’. The main aim of the event was to promote existing cooperation between Thailand and Oman in the field of tourism and provide an opportunity for business matching for investors from both sides.

Eleven Thai private sector entities participated in the event including Phayathai Hospital, Vitallife Wellness Center at Bumrungrad Hospital, Al Meroz (the first halal hotel in Thailand), and Sheraton Hotel. H E Jesda Katavetin, Ambassador of Thailand to Oman said, “For many years, tourism has been one of the most successful industries of Thailand.

In 2015, we attracted 29.8mn visitors and earned approximately US$40bn. A lot of thanks to Omani travellers who have made Oman one of our fastest growing tourism markets in the GCC. In fact, Thailand welcomed more than 85,000 Omanis last year, with an increase of 13 per cent compared to the previous year. We hope our country will have a chance to welcome more Omani tourists in the coming years.”

H E Katavetin added, “In addition to a 30-day tourist visa exemption, Thailand has also offered a multiple-entry visa with  six months validity and entitlement to stay for a period of 60 days at a time for Omanis. And for those who wish to get medical treatment in Thailand, they can apply for a 60-day medical tourist visa, which can be renewed up to six months depending on supporting documents from hospitals. These options reflect how serious we are on facilitate entries of Omanis to Thailand.”

The delegation from Thailand was headed by Tanes Petsuwan.

Petsuwan said, “Our internationally acclaimed hospitals offer a wide range of high-quality, patient-centric medical services from orthopaedics, cardiology, cosmetic surgery to dentistry at affordable prices. Many hospitals out of 200 international standard hospitals and clinics, have Arabic-speaking interpreters as well as American and European board doctors and nurses. So, I hope that you still keep Thailand on top of your mind for your next retreat.”

Source: Muscatdaily