One of the most common questions buyers ask me is:
"KC, is this property overpriced?"
It sounds like a simple question.
It isn't.
There are numbers, of course. Comparable properties. Land values. Asking prices. Market conditions. Construction quality. Location.
But there is also psychology.
Sometimes when somebody tells me a property is overpriced, what they really mean is:
"I would like to buy it cheaper."
And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Negotiation is part of property.
But before deciding whether something is genuinely overpriced, we first need to understand what value actually means.
We don't want overpriced listings either
At Town & Country Property, we generally don't want to add obviously overpriced properties to our portfolio.
Why would we?
Advertising costs money. Viewings cost time. Following up with clients takes effort.
If we genuinely believe nobody is going to buy the property at anything close to the owner's expectations, everybody wastes their time.
That doesn't mean an asking price has to be non-negotiable.
Quite the opposite.
A genuine buyer is always free to make a genuine offer, and there is usually some degree of flexibility.
But there is a difference between negotiation and believing that every property in Thailand should automatically be a bargain.
Some foreign buyers still arrive with the idea that Thailand must be inexpensive simply because it is Thailand.
Others are bargain hunters by nature.
"You can always try."
Fair enough.
But unusually low prices often have a reason.
COVID changed people's idea of a bargain
During COVID, genuine distress opportunities appeared in Pattaya.
Some owners suddenly needed liquidity. Others could not travel. Businesses failed. Personal circumstances changed.
Years earlier, something similar happened when the Russian Ruble weakened dramatically and some Russian owners had to return home.
For a period, buyers could sometimes secure properties at prices that would not have been achievable under normal market conditions.
The problem is when those exceptional transactions become somebody's permanent reference point.
They weren't necessarily normal market value.
They were distress-market value.
Markets move.
What matters today is what today's market is prepared to absorb.
That, ultimately, is what an achievable price is:
What a willing buyer is prepared to pay and a willing seller is prepared to accept.
Asking price is not market value
Owners can ask whatever they want.
That doesn't make it market value.
We naturally look at competing properties when assessing a listing, but you have to understand what you are comparing.
A perfect example is Wongamat.
You have an established older development such as Ananya Wongamat Condominium.
Next door, you have a much newer luxury product such as Arom Wongamat, which entered the market at prices exceeding THB 200,000 per square metre.
Does that suddenly make an older Ananya unit worth 50 percent more?
No.
A new project's pricing doesn't automatically revalue every neighbouring building.
The products are different.
Age, facilities, construction specification, architecture, common areas, maintenance, marketing, buyer profile and overall positioning all matter.
This is where owners sometimes make a mistake.
They see what a brand-new development next door is asking and conclude:
"Then mine must be worth almost the same."
It doesn't work like that.
And sometimes I don't understand condo buyers at all
I should admit something.
Personally, I am a house person, not a condo person.
I like space.
Privacy.
A swimming pool.
A garden.
Storage.
Friends coming over for dinner or a BBQ.
For the amount some buyers happily pay for a relatively compact condominium, they could sometimes own a substantial private residence with land and a swimming pool.
To me, land and house can offer considerably more bang for your buck.
But that is my lifestyle preference.
Another buyer may desperately want a high-floor beachfront apartment with an uninterrupted sea view and happily pay THB 100,000, THB 200,000 or even more per square metre for it.
That's fine too.
Although, being slightly cheeky, I sometimes wonder how valuable the ocean view becomes at 10 o'clock at night when you're staring into a black hole.
But again, that's me.
Value is also in the eye of the beholder.
Price per square metre doesn't tell the whole story
I prefer that expression to saying price per square metre can be "misleading".
Nobody is necessarily misleading anybody.
It simply doesn't always tell you enough.
Take a condominium with a very large terrace.
That terrace is part of the registered area of the unit.
You bought those square metres.
But 200 square metres with 70 square metres of open-air terrace is clearly not the same product as 200 square metres of internal living space.
And there is another consideration.
You may also pay common management fees over those terrace square metres.
With an off-plan condominium, the buyer will generally also have a sinking-fund contribution.
That is another acquisition cost.
So when comparing one condo against another, I want to know what those square metres actually consist of and what ownership of them will cost.
Houses are different: start with the land
With land and houses, I don't like comparing properties using a simple construction price per square metre.
It doesn't work particularly well.
The starting point is normally the land.
How large is the plot?
Where is it?
What is the surrounding land worth?
Then we consider the house, age, construction quality, swimming pool, landscaping, renovation requirements, privacy, access and everything else that forms part of the property.
A villa is a package.
Reducing that entire package to one price-per-square-metre number can create a false sense of precision.
Foreign quota can affect pricing, but not everywhere
Foreign and Thai quota ownership is another area where generalisations can be dangerous.
In Pattaya, developers historically often had little difficulty selling their foreign quota.
As a result, foreign-quota units could sometimes attract a premium.
Thai-quota inventory might then be stimulated through more attractive prices or payment terms, including a larger balloon payment at completion.
That doesn't mean the same pricing dynamic exists everywhere in Thailand.
In parts of Bangkok, particularly projects dominated by Thai buyers, the difference may be negligible.
Property is extremely local.
Sometimes even two buildings standing beside one another behave as completely different markets.
Sellers need education too
People often assume an agent's job is simply to convince sellers to reduce their price.
Not necessarily.
A good agent should help the seller understand how the market works.
For example, an owner may say:
"List my property at THB 7 million. Transfer fees 50/50. No discount."
My response would be that some flexibility is sensible.
Nine out of ten buyers want to feel they achieved something in the negotiation.
It doesn't necessarily have to be a huge discount.
Sometimes a relatively small concession gives the buyer the psychological satisfaction of knowing they made a deal.
A seller refusing to move one baht can sometimes derail an otherwise perfectly acceptable transaction.
Then there is another common approach:
"I want THB 7 million net. Put your commission on top."
That can create a mess when the property is an open listing with several agents.
One agency adds one commission.
Another adds something else.
Soon the same property appears online at THB 7.25 million, THB 7.4 million and THB 7.5 million.
Now the buyer starts wondering:
What is the actual price?
Our preference is simple.
Give every agent the same commercial conditions, including commission.
One property.
One asking price.
One clear message to the market.
Sometimes we tell sellers to increase the price
Yes, really.
Over the years, I have had owners tell me they would be perfectly happy receiving, say, THB 10 million for their property.
If our assessment of current market conditions tells us it is worth more, we tell them.
Why wouldn't we?
Our responsibility is not merely to achieve a transaction.
It is also to help the client achieve a fair result.
Tell an owner that their property is worth more than they thought, then eventually sell it accordingly?
Happy days. Friends forever.
Expensive does not automatically mean poor value
Some properties are expensive for a good reason.
For me, one major consideration is future appreciation potential.
You are not only buying today's property.
You are buying today's property in tomorrow's location.
Take Bang Saray.
The broader Eastern Economic Corridor, infrastructure improvements and continuing development along the Eastern Seaboard create a very different long-term proposition from simply looking at today's asking price.
Can anybody guarantee what a property will be worth five years from now?
Absolutely not.
I wouldn't.
But an experienced broker should understand where investment, infrastructure and demand are moving.
If I believe an area has realistic potential to outperform the broader market over time, then a property that initially appears expensive may still represent very good value.
Value and price are not the same thing.
Cheap can become very expensive
The opposite is also true.
A buyer finds a "bargain".
Fantastic.
But then comes the renovation.
The buyer estimated THB 500,000.
It costs THB 1.5 million.
Suddenly the bargain isn't quite so impressive.
Or perhaps the smooth-talking salesperson promised fantastic rental returns.
The spreadsheet looked wonderful.
Expected rental income: X.
Projected yield: X percent.
Then nobody rents it.
Or the achievable rent turns out to be considerably lower than promised.
The expected return disappears, but the common fees, maintenance, insurance, utilities and running costs continue.
Now the cheap property is costing money every month.
Or somebody decided property insurance was an unnecessary expense.
Then a serious storm arrives.
That can become an extraordinarily expensive saving.
My father's old saying applies here again:
If a deal looks too good to be true, it often is.
Resale starts before you buy
When I assess a property for a buyer, I am already thinking about the next buyer.
Will somebody still want this property in five years?
Ten years?
Nobody can read tomorrow's newspaper.
COVID certainly reminded all of us of that.
But there is a phrase I like:
You can't read tomorrow's newspaper, but you can read the headlines.
Experienced brokers recognise trends.
We follow infrastructure.
We hear about new commercial developments.
We see where roads are improving.
We know where new retail, hospitality, schools or other facilities are planned.
Sometimes we have advance knowledge of changes that will materially affect a location.
And this works both ways.
A new commercial centre nearby may significantly improve a property's appeal.
But perhaps that wonderful uninterrupted sea view is going to disappear because another tower can legally be constructed on the land in front of you.
Future resale potential is often influenced by what is going to happen outside your front door.
The THB 2 million Versace upgrade
I remember being invited to inspect what the owner described as:
"The most elaborate luxury condominium in the region."
Naturally, we were curious.
We arrived.
From the doorknob to the carpet and just about everything in between, the entire apartment was Versace-style.
The owner believed the decoration added approximately THB 2 million to the property's value.
Our assessment was somewhat different.
We thought a future buyer might need to spend approximately THB 200,000 removing it.
We didn't take the listing.
That story illustrates something important.
Money spent is not automatically value added.
A seller may see a THB 2 million upgrade.
A buyer may see a THB 200,000 renovation bill.
The market decides which interpretation matters.
There is no standard Pattaya discount
Another common question is:
"How much can I negotiate off the asking price?"
There is no standard percentage.
None.
It depends entirely on the property, the asking price, the seller, the buyer and how eager both parties are to make the deal happen.
Completely unrealistic offers?
We normally decline them immediately.
There is little point wasting everybody's time.
But if an offer is realistic, we work with it.
I sometimes call it massaging the deal.
We try to convince the seller to move slightly downward.
We try to convince the buyer to move slightly upward.
Somewhere in between, the deal starts making sense for both sides.
Usually, we get there.
And occasionally, if everybody is extremely close and our commission is the final obstacle, we may even contribute a little ourselves to make the transaction work.
Why?
Because ultimately: we are matchmakers.
So how do you know if you're getting value?
If I had to give a buyer one simple piece of advice, it would be this:
Work with an experienced broker.
Not because an agent automatically deserves a commission.
They don't.
The right broker should earn it.
A professional who genuinely knows the local market should understand values better than somebody who has just started browsing property portals.
They should know which prices are realistic.
Which sellers may negotiate.
Which projects deserve caution.
Which locations are improving.
Which future developments matter.
Which apparent bargains may become expensive.
And occasionally they should be prepared to tell you:
"Don't buy this one."
A good broker should not make your property purchase more expensive simply because there is a commission involved.
The opposite should be true.
They should either help you negotiate a better deal or help protect you from making a very expensive mistake.
If they can do neither, then you probably have the wrong broker.
Author Bio
KC Cuijpers is the founder and CEO of Town & Country Property, a long-established real estate agency serving Pattaya, Jomtien, Bangsaray, and the wider Eastern Seaboard. With close to 25 years of local property experience, KC has been involved in sales, rentals, land transactions, project development, and advisory work. His approach is practical, straightforward, and based on real-life experience, not theory. Through TCP News, he shares honest market insight, useful property guidance, and a little common sense for buyers, sellers, investors, and anyone considering making Thailand their home.
FAQ
Not necessarily.
The value of any property is ultimately determined by supply and demand, not simply by its age.
A well-established, highly sought-after condominium can be a much better and more valuable purchase than a brand-new development. In Pattaya, some older projects have already proved themselves through years of actual transactions, occupancy, management quality and capital appreciation.
Good examples include Saranchol, The Cove, Northpoint, Northshore, Jomtien Complex Condotel and, by now, Reflection. These developments have established a track record and a recognised position in the market.
New developments certainly have advantages. Everything is new, contemporary and usually designed around current buyer expectations, with modern facilities, finishes and often high-quality imported materials.
But there is another side to the story. Many newer Pattaya condominium projects also contain 1,000 to 1,500 units, often with comparatively small unit sizes. That creates a great deal of future resale competition within the same building.
And importantly, a new project has not yet demonstrated capital appreciation. An established project may already have done exactly that.
So I would never advise a buyer to pay more simply because a condominium is new.
The right price is ultimately the price the market can absorb and is willing to pay.
Prestige can sometimes justify an additional premium, particularly in genuinely iconic branded residential developments. Pattaya, however, has not yet really reached the level of the international “trophy residence” market associated with names such as Porsche Design and similar global luxury brands.
So compare the property, the location, the supply, the demand and its proven resale history.
Newer does not automatically mean better value.
It depends entirely on the condition of the property, the scope of the renovation and, most importantly, what you intend to do with it.
If the objective is to renovate and resell a condo or house, my advice is usually quite simple: buy as well as possible and keep the renovation commercially sensible.
Take an older, dated house with a decent garden and a fundamentally good structure. You may not need to rebuild it. Fresh paint, improved landscaping and modernised kitchens and bathrooms can completely change the first impression of a property. Those are also some of the areas buyers notice first.
A good-sized garden may almost be asking for a private swimming pool. In the right property, spending around THB 500,000 on a pool could potentially add considerably more than that to the eventual selling price.
But be careful not to overdo it.
A renovation intended for resale should not become a personal design project. You may adore purple wallpaper, but the next buyer might not. Keep colours, finishes and design choices attractive to the widest possible market.
First impressions count.
For more substantial renovations, get a realistic quotation from a trustworthy contractor before committing to the purchase. A good contractor may initially appear more expensive, but delivering the agreed quality, on time and within budget can ultimately save a great deal of money and frustration.
And don’t fall in love with a complete wreck simply because the location is fantastic.
A carefully calculated fixer-upper can represent excellent value. But the purchase price plus the genuine renovation budget still needs to make commercial sense against the property’s likely finished market value.
Renovation can create value. Over-renovation can destroy it.
Not by itself.
A rental yield calculation can be useful, but first ask a much more basic question: who is actually going to rent this property?
Take a new condominium development with 1,500 or more units, including perhaps hundreds of virtually identical 24 sqm studios and 32 sqm one-bedroom apartments. On paper, somebody may present an attractive projected rental return.
But you are competing with hundreds of owners offering essentially the same product, in exactly the same location.
That is not my favourite recipe for sustainable rental yield.
Small condominium units can certainly rent, but they are generally less attractive to the longer-term tenant market that we prefer to work with.
At Town & Country Property, our focus is much more on serious long-term rentals, generally 12 months or longer and from around THB 15,000 per month upwards. This tends to attract a much more manageable tenant profile, including corporate and professional tenants.
In my experience, well-selected properties in this market can produce approximately 4.5% to 6.5% net annual returns. That may sound less exciting than some of the percentages advertised in property brochures, but I would much rather see a realistic and sustainable return than an impressive number created on a spreadsheet.
Be particularly careful with “guaranteed rental returns.”
There is rarely such a thing as free money. Sometimes the cost of that guarantee has effectively already been included in the price you paid for the property.
Don’t get too greedy.
There is also an interesting longer-term story developing around Pattaya: the Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC). The EEC Office currently identifies manpower demand of more than 500,000 positions across its clusters for 2025–2029.
Not all of those people will need Pattaya accommodation, of course. But even a relatively small percentage of professionals, managers, specialists and executives moving into the wider region creates additional housing demand.
And this is where I see an opportunity.
Good-quality executive pool villas are still relatively difficult to find in the Pattaya region. Larger, well-located condominium units can also benefit, particularly in established developments and carefully selected newer projects.
So don’t buy an investment property simply because somebody promises you a high percentage.
Look at real tenant demand, competing supply, achievable rent, operating costs, resale potential and future demand for that particular type of property.
A genuine 5% return from the right property can be a far better investment than a promised 8% from the wrong one.
Generally, no.
The word “expected” is important. It means we are talking about a prediction, not a fact.
We cannot read tomorrow’s newspaper today, but sometimes we can already see the headlines.
Infrastructure plans, major investment, new employment centres, schools, hospitals, retail, tourism development and changing residential patterns can all give us clues about where an area may be heading.
But in today’s market, I would not advise paying more simply because somebody tells you an area will become more valuable in the future.
That would be rather silly.
The real opportunity is identifying future improvement before the majority of the market has recognised it.
Only a relatively small “top of the iceberg” tends to see these changes early enough to benefit substantially. That is where good local knowledge, experience and a little vision can create a real bang for your buck.
This is also why it makes sense to work with an established local property specialist. Their job is not simply to show you what is for sale today. They should understand the history of the market, know what is genuinely changing, recognise where demand is moving and distinguish real opportunity from marketing noise.
At Town & Country Property, that local knowledge is exactly what we have built over more than two decades in Pattaya and the Eastern Seaboard.
But there is an important rule:
Never pay tomorrow’s price today.
If all of the expected future improvement has already been incorporated into the asking price, you are effectively taking the development risk while somebody else has already taken the profit.
Buy because the property represents sensible value today, with future improvement providing additional upside.
That is investing.
Paying a premium for something that may or may not happen is speculation.
The first thing that comes to mind is very simple:
Wrong location.
A property may look attractively priced, but if the location works against it, resale can become very difficult.
And “wrong location” does not necessarily mean being far away.
It can mean unpleasant immediate surroundings: tin sheds, noisy karaoke, workshops, poorly maintained neighbouring properties, agricultural activity, awkward access, a dirt track, or a road so narrow that buyers immediately start worrying about getting in and out.
It can also mean buying a beautiful sea-view condominium with a vacant plot directly in front of it.
That empty land may look harmless today, but tomorrow it could become another development that blocks your view. And even if it does not permanently damage the view, you may still live through two or three years of construction noise, dust and inconvenience.
In a condominium project, buyers should also look carefully at the management and ongoing costs.
Excessive maintenance fees, poor juristic-person management, neglected common areas or badly run facilities can all make an otherwise attractive unit harder to sell.
Another factor is the composition of the development.
Projects heavily dominated by one nationality can sometimes have a much narrower resale market. We have seen examples of developments strongly associated with Japanese tenants in Sriracha, or Russian buyers in certain Pattaya-area estates. There is nothing wrong with that, but a narrower buyer profile can reduce liquidity when you eventually want to sell.
And sometimes the problem is surprisingly human.
A seller who talks too much, interferes in every viewing, or simply makes the process unpleasant can actually make a perfectly good property harder to sell. Yes, it happens. 😊
There is also an important current consideration for properties held through Thai companies.
With the present scrutiny surrounding nominee or proxy shareholder structures, properties held through Thai companies can be much more difficult to resell, particularly where buyers or their lawyers are uncomfortable with the ownership structure. The same concern can apply to condominiums held through a Thai company rather than directly in foreign ownership.
So never look at price alone.
A cheap property with a difficult location, poor management, legal complications or a narrow future buyer market can remain cheap for a very long time.
A bargain is only a bargain if somebody else will still want to buy it from you later.
Sometimes the right decision is simply to walk away.
After 25 years in property, I could say “trust your gut feeling”, but that is perhaps a little unfair because experience plays a big part in developing that instinct.
Still, if something keeps bothering you, do not ignore it.
One obvious warning sign is when the deal structure becomes too complicated.
Unusual payment terms, offshore transfers, unclear ownership arrangements, changing conditions, multiple side agreements or explanations that become more confusing every time you ask a question should all make you slow down.
A good property transaction does not need to feel mysterious.
The seller matters too.
An “iffy” seller who repeatedly changes their mind, alters agreed terms, introduces new conditions or becomes difficult during negotiations can turn a good property into a bad deal.
And never underestimate the family factor.
If your spouse or partner does not really like the property, take that seriously. You may be able to negotiate another THB 500,000 off the price, but that does not suddenly make somebody enjoy living there.
“The missus doesn’t really like it” is, in my book, a perfectly valid reason to walk away.
Finally, be very careful with budget stretching.
There is always the temptation to think: “For just a little more, we can get this one.”
Then a little more becomes another million, plus furniture, renovation, transfer costs, maintenance and everything else that follows.
You still need to have a life after buying the property.
A good purchase should make you feel comfortable, not financially trapped.
So negotiate hard when the property is right and the deal makes sense.
But when the structure becomes too complicated, the seller becomes unreliable, the family is unconvinced or the budget starts becoming uncomfortable, walking away is often the smartest negotiation of all.
There is always another property.