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.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
KC Cuijpers is CEO of Town & Country Property Co., Ltd. and has worked in the Pattaya property market since 2003. His experience spans residential sales and rentals, development, investment property and decades of working directly with Thai and international buyers, sellers and developers throughout Pattaya, Jomtien, East Pattaya and Bang Saray.