Todd McGowan No it's not cheaper to live in UK and the USA is even more expensive but if you don't meet the requirements then you can't get the visa and Thailand would be out of the questions so as I said maybe you should reconsider. There might be another country with less financial requirements than Thailand or you might already be settles in USA and the financial requirements might not be as bad, like owning you own home & having sufficient land to be able to grow food etc. The point is if you can't afford the requirements of a long term visa then Thai Immigration will not want to issue it and that's not even thinking about you are going to be in a really bad way if you have a medical emergency. Having said that I am also thinking from the point of view of a normal western country where you don't go bankrupt when you visit a hospital so a medical emergency in Thailand is going to be much cheaper than USA but the cost doesn't really matter if you don't have to money to pay the hospital or the money to get the visa in the first place.

There can be some issues opening bank accounts especially in more rural areas, a friend of mine could only open an account with a house book in his name, they wouldn't even accept a residency certificate but he was in a very rural area with very few expats so the bank was probably just working on what is necessary for a Thai. It also varies between banks & branches, I had trouble in the Kasikorn branch in Central Khon Kaen but no problems at the Lotus branch, both time I had a residency certificate. If one bank/branch gives problems even with the residency certificate then try another as it's common to get different 'interpretations' of the rules.

Not everyone wants to live the same lifestyle, if you explain what you are expecting/wanting when living here then it would be much easier for people to give helpful comments on not only what arrangements you need but where would be a suitable place to live and even what the costs are likely to be. To give some idea, if you can speak Thai or Issan, like real Thai food and want a quiet life then living in the Rural parts of Issan are more suitable and much cheaper but if you only speak a non-Thai language then you will need to live in a city and even then it's not so easy in the Issan so then you would want to stay in a more touristy area which will be much more expensive and can be more hectic especially if that's what you want. Living expenses can easily vary by a factor of 10:1 or more depending on where you live, what you eat and your life style

I've never done this as I'm on a long term visa however as Immigration are reportedly cracking down on 'non tourists' I would think this might be seen as 'dodgy' by Immigration as a normal tourist is not likely to stay for the 60 days, get a 30 day extension then go to a different country for just 1 day and then return and try to stay another 90 days. This sounds more like trying to live in Thailand without the required long term visa which is what that Immigration are reported to say they are cracking down on. If you were to return to your own country for a few weeks and then return I could see this being accepted but what you are saying sound like what they are trying to stop. As I said I've no experience of this but this is from what I've seen the expat news and other reports on the Internet, I hope it's helpful.

Yes but in the title he says "If the 60-day Visa exemption is reduced to 30-day....." so I'm trying to explain that they are 2 separate things.

Visa 'exemption' or waiver means that you don't need to get a visa to enter the country if you meet the requirements, if you don't meet the requirements for a visa waiver then you have to get a visa before travelling or get a 'visa on arrival'. All 3 are completely different and changes to 1 do not necessarily impact the others. The changes, that I keep hearing about and are not decided yet, are to the visa waiver not the tourist visa unless there are also changes to that and I haven't heard of them. Your best bet is to check with the Thai embassy in your country but normally when you get a visa it states the duration it is valid for and how long you can stay or if you enter Thailand on a visa waiver or visa on arrival the duration of your stay will be the current terms and states on the passport stamp when you have to leave but you can normally get a 30 day extension at an immigration office for a fee.

I think this is a another post by the same person I've already commented on. If you can't afford to meet the conditions of the visa even if you can spend the large fee needed to get 2 visas /retirement extensions I think you really can't afford the potential cost of an emergency so I think you should reconsider moving.

I agree with most of these comments but I think it's quite obvious that you mean USD as Americans are the most likely people to think that $ means their currency also you didn't say if that was for a week, month or heavan forbid a year. The thing to remember is that Thailand is no different to any other country in the world, living expenses depend on your living style and the major factors are if you have already purchased property or renting plus can you live like a local or are you going to try and live like a tourist. If you live like a local you can live quite well on a 200 to 500 Baht a day but if you live like a tourist then you can easily burn through 5000 Baht and much more if you are staying in a hotel and eating in western restaurants. The best advice it to come over on a long holiday and try to live the live you are expecting after retiring and see how much it costs because only you know what you will be spending your money on.

It does depend on where you are and who you see but in the last 14 years of doing it myself I've found that so long as you try, you are polite and don't get angry the Immigration staff tend to be helpful, more so when you move out of the major tourist cities. My recommendation is to give it a try yourself first as you can always get an agent to do it within a week and so long as you don't leave it to the last minute you should have plenty of time to do that, Obviously things would be different if you didn't meet the financial requirements, If it's not too far away you could also just go to Immigration, see what you need, pick up the necessary forms and ask them about it, that probably won't work well in Bangkok or Pattaya but shouldn't be a problem elsewhere.

I have been doing my own retirement extension for 14 years, first in Pattaya and now in Khon Kaen and all they have ever wanted is the letter from the bank, a photocopy of the bank book and now a 12 month statement. You need the bank book to be updated on the day you apply and the bank letter/statement issued the same day, just withdraw 100 Baht from the ATM as you go into the bank for the documents and get them to update the book & photocopy it as well. I have never seen the need for using an agent that will cost (apparently) up to 20,000 Baht for something I can do in a few minutes for the 1,900 Baht fee at Immigration and about 200 Baht at the bank but it's up to you.