look if your going to retire in Thailand. Bring money. Health care is cheap out of pocket If you can barely afford Thailand and your 77 its best to stay where your country pays for your health benefits.
Listen. You come into thailand on a visa exempt and go straight away to an agent. They will make you a tm30 and they will get your bank account in a few hours in one day and done, then prep you for the non 0 visa. This process takes a few weeks…first day, They will fund your new bank account with 800,000 of the agencies money and then they will show you how to withdraw it back out into the agents account leaving your account empty, at this time its good to put a few hundred dollars in the account to keep if from closing over time. All done same day so you wont have too fund it yourself ever for the Visa. then the agent will walk you into immigration to drop off docs same day. Then you wait a couple weeks and go back to agent to get your passport with visa stamps. The whole process costed me $1200 usd the agent will report to immigration every 90 days for you no charge… renewal of visa is $375 a year. If you want a drivers lic they can do that too for cheap…The process is a no brainer because the agent does it all. they will also take care of passport photos. Some people say this is illegal. Bs. Cash is King in Thailand. Theres 1000s of agents doing this process everyday. All day long.