Property due diligence in Thailand: the complete checklist

Start with the title grade, then the chain

The title deed is the ground truth of a Thai property. The strongest grade is the Chanote (Nor Sor 4 Jor): full ownership, GPS-surveyed, and the only grade that supports confident purchase. Weaker grades carry weaker rights — Nor Sor 3 Gor (NS3G) confirms possession and is surveyed but not fully titled, Nor Sor 3 (NS3) is possession with unsurveyed boundaries, and Sor Kor 1 (SK-1) is a claim of occupancy only.

The chain matters as much as the current grade. A history like SK-1 → NS3G → Chanote, subdivided in 2024, is a normal, checkable progression; gaps in the chain, or a very recent upgrade, warrant scrutiny before a payment milestone.

Title searches happen at the Land Office, the provincial office where titles are searched, encumbrances registered and transfers executed. Physical presence is often required there — an online check is not a title search.

What the grades mean, in one line:

• Chanote (Nor Sor 4 Jor) — full ownership, GPS-surveyed; the strongest grade.
• Nor Sor 3 Gor (NS3G) — confirmed possession, surveyed, upgradable.
• Nor Sor 3 (NS3) — possession with unsurveyed boundaries.
• Sor Kor 1 (SK-1) — claim of occupancy only; often the origin of a chain.

Read what is registered on the title

A title carries more than ownership. A servitude is a right of way registered on the title — and an access road that is used by custom but not registered is a red flag: legal access then depends on the seller's goodwill. Encumbrances — a mortgage, a lease, a usufruct or a superficies — are registered against the title and searched at the Land Office.

Two structures appear often in foreign-buyer villa deals. A usufruct is the right to use a property and take its income, up to lifetime. A superficies is the right to own structures on land owned by someone else. Both are legitimate and registrable — the question is always what is actually registered.

Check the ownership route before you pay

Foreigners cannot own land in Thailand, so the ownership route decides everything. A condominium freehold is allowed, subject to the building's 49% foreign quota — headroom must be verified, not assumed. A leasehold is a 30-year registered lease; renewal clauses are generally not enforceable against a future owner, so a '30+30+30' promise is a contractual promise only, and the verification says so plainly.

A Thai company can own land, and is legitimate only with genuine Thai shareholders and real substance. A nominee structure — Thai shareholders holding shares on a foreigner's behalf — is illegal under the Land Code and the Foreign Business Act. Suradeed assesses nominee risk in a dossier; it never designs or facilitates such a structure.

Bring the money in a way that can be documented

The FET form — the Foreign Exchange Transaction form — is the bank evidence that your purchase funds entered Thailand from abroad. It matters twice: it proves the funds entered Thailand from abroad, and it is needed to repatriate the proceeds later. A missing FET is a real problem at resale.

A verification records the money trail as evidence like any other document: what exists, what is missing, and who verified it — each entry with its source and reference number.

Off-plan: the permit exists, or it is a red flag

For an off-plan purchase, the two usual failure points are the building permit and the mother title. The building permit is issued by the municipality (the Tessaban), and for off-plan the question is whether it exists at all — 'it's coming' is a red flag. The mother title is the parent parcel the development subdivides from, and villas are often sold before subdivision completes.

Zoning decides what may be built: the city plan colours land by use, and environmental zones add constraints — on Koh Samui, for example, Zone 2 orange allows residential construction with a height cap commonly set at 12 metres. Samui and Phuket also restrict building above certain gradients and elevations. Land can be legally owned and legally unbuildable — which is why the verification checks what the land can actually carry, not only who owns it.

Know what a verification delivers

A structured verification ends with an evidence ledger — the list of source documents behind each finding, with issuing office, reference number, date and reviewer — and a verdict: proceed, proceed with conditions, or walk away. Red flags are named as such and become conditions before any payment. The result is a bilingual certificate (English and French), signed by a named licensed partner lawyer under the firm's own professional responsibility.

The fixed tiers are priced from a published grid — €990 (THB 38,610) for a simple freehold condo resale, €1,590 (THB 62,010) for a villa or a straightforward leasehold. Anything structured is quoted by the partner firm after review, from €2,500, and the turnaround runs in business days from confirmed payment, not from the quote. The verified file is kept for ten years.

What Suradeed is, and is not

Suradeed is not a law firm and gives no legal advice. Every legal finding and recommendation in a verification certificate is produced and signed by a licensed Thai law firm, which is responsible for it. Suradeed defines the verification protocol, coordinates the work, controls its quality and delivers the result.

You are billed in two lines for that reason: the partner firm's fee, which Suradeed collects as payment agent for the firm, and Suradeed's own platform and coordination fee. Your invoice shows both. Suradeed accepts no commission or referral benefit from any seller, developer, agent or broker — independence is contractual, not a policy statement.