Open an account with Bkk bank then use Wise.

Even cards with no foreign transaction fees and atm fee reimbursement like Schwab’s card isn’t as cheap as Wise.

And if your home bank does free wire transfers then Wise is even cheaper vs doing an ACH withdrawal from your home account.

So see if you can find a bank that does free wire transfers and lets you do them online and not at a branch office and that’s as good as it’ll get.

@Duncan ******

I know, which is what I said

@Duncan ******

Compared to 1979, 2015 is quite recent

@Duncan ******

Yeah but it wasn’t enforced until somewhat recently.

It wasn’t even practical to enforce until the technology was there to computerize it and do it online.

Imagine every hotel, hostel and apartment owner having to go to an immigration office in person to register tenants.

The lines would stretch to the horizon.

@Harrison ******

A few nationalities get that.

Guess they gave up enough to get Thailand to grant it.

If Thailand gave 90 days to everyone or made long term stays easy, a lot of people in the business of providing work arounds would be very mad

@Julie ***

I’d recommend searching online for job portals which specialize in remote work jobs, then find the ones which allow full remote, contact them to ask if they are ok with the employee working from Thailand then submit resumes to those who are.

A lot of the remote position listings will say something like “Remote US” or “Remote UK” but that could mean either you can work from anywhere but have to be legally allowed to work in that country (US or UK for example) or that you can work remote but only within that country.

Also keep in mind the work hours.

If they expect your husband to work US or even UK hours then that can be a big lifestyle hurdle.

If you want to keep somewhat normal Thai hours then you’d have to find a company willing to be flexible on the hours, which reduces the pool of available jobs even more.

If working at night is an issue then finding a job in Thailand might be worth the lower pay and other issues such as longer hours, probably having to live in Bangkok, language and cultural barriers, etc.

@Michael *******

Then there’s the issue of long term job security.

Are these higher paying jobs just project based. 6 months to 2 years and they’re over and you’re now scrambling to find the next gig, or is it a truly long term position at a stable company that you can build your life around.

Things to consider as well.

Don’t want to buy a condo, car and a dog then a couple years later having a fire sale because you have to move back to your home country.

@Michael *******

Totally depends on the actual position. When you’re around 100k it’s usually a management job not a coding job and you’re probably expected to speak Thai.

There are some international companies that do hire foreigners to work in their Bangkok branch which pay western salaries.

They’re few and far between.

But even 90k a month is half what a mid-level back end developer is making in smaller cities in the US. And that’s on the low end, without any kind of bonuses or stock options or 401k/403b/pension contributions, all of which would be significantly less in Thailand if available at all unless it’s a large international corp willing to pay western compensation.

In my opinion it’s best to find companies willing to hire remote workers who don’t care where you work from.

Industries that might be sensitive to working outside of specific countries would be healthcare and finance.

So those can be picky about where their remote workers live.

@Michael *******

Some do pay more but for web dev jobs that’s not typical in Thailand.

That might be what you’d get as a higher level manager of an IT department.

Then they’d also expect you to be fluent in Thai.

Most of the front end, back end and full stack developer jobs I’ve seen in Thailand range from 25-50k regardless of whether or not they’re open to foreigners.

I’ve seen some outliers that are considerably higher but still half or less than half of what you could earn from a western company working remote, even after shelling out like $4500 a year for a company and work permit setup

@Julie ***

They’ll be paying Thai wages and usually with Thai hours 10h/day 6d/week although I’ve seen some web dev jobs open to foreigners that did 10 hour days 5 a week and fewer still that were 8 hours 5 days a week.

But even the highest paying ones were maybe like 50k baht a month and in Bangkok and those were 6 day a week jobs, usually lead developer jobs that is going to require a lot of meetings and time managing Thais (with all the cultural quirks that need to be learned for that).

Oh and that’s 50k before income tax.

Better question is can you both live off a monthly take home of 25-40k in Bangkok the way you want to live.

The best option is to find a job with an international company that allows remote work, set up a Thai company to get a work permit and go that route.

It’s more complex and there’s costs involved with the company/work permit but that’s nothing compared to making 4-5 times higher salary, being able to live anywhere in Thailand and not just Bangkok, not dealing with Bangkok daily commutes and all the other quirks of being a foreigner working in a Thai office.