You do not get more than the 2 years on an OA. That 2nd year isn’t your OA visa but a 1 year permission to stay stamp. After the 1st year of your OA you must purchase re-entry permits to keep the permission to stay stamp alive if you choose to travel outside Thailand during that 2nd year. After the 2nd year you can return to your home country to obtain a new OA visa and start the process over again. After the first year you can also just begin applying for 1 year extensions of the OA visa at the Immigration Department inside Thailand. You will have to meet the financial requirements for a 1 year extension and you will continue to need to meet the health insurance requirement.

I had an OA for 6 years. It was a good visa in 2017 but these days I would recommend getting a 90-day non-O visa and just go directly to 1 year extensions. You can still get health insurance but there is no reason to have it connected to your visa.

I got my Kasikorn account at the first branch I tried but that was 7 years ago. Times have changed, I guess. If you ever need a 1 year bank statement then Bangkok Bank will make you wait. Kasikorn can produce one on the spot. The Kbank app is very good. The customer service has been great.

Everyone says don’t buy the accident insurance. I did buy it and a couple of months later I had an accident, made a claim and was paid promptly. I bought more coverage the next year and would still be with them if they hadn’t cut me off at 65.

I went to a lawyer in Bangkok. We discussed what should be in it. It was written in English and Thai and explained to her in Thai. The law firm accompanied us to the Bang Rak amphur for the marriage registration in order to make sure the pre-nup was filed properly.

Regarding the OA visa, it requires health insurance which may or may not be a headache to purchase as well as being a recurring expense.

@Sophia *****

The typical retirement visa is the O visa. It is only a 90 day visa so you quickly get to 1 year extensions.

For an American to apply for a 1 year extension of their O visa you have to show 12 months of deposits of 65,000 baht to a Thai bank. This typically means you have to deposit the 800,000 baht the first year to give you the time to build up the bank records. The advantage of the monthly income method is that you can spend all of it and your money is not tied up. It just will take you a year+ to get there.

@Wayne ********

I know you can get the OX in Australia, not sure about the US. In any case the LTR and OX have pretty high $$ requirements.

The LTR is only 18 months old which is partly why I mention it. Not many people know about it.

I had an OA visa, obtained from the LA consulate, for 6 years. I now have a 10 year pensioner LTR visa.

One other option is the 10 pensioner LTR visa. This requires health insurance (with some lenient options) and a passive income of $80,000/yr. If you think this might be of interest to you then look for it on the Thailand Board of Investment (BOI) website.

These days I would recommend you come to Thailand and obtain a non-immigrant O visa. That is a 90 day visa and then you get 1 year extensions of that visa indefinitely. It does not require insurance. I, of course, recommend having insurance but if it isn't tied to your visa then you have more options. You will have to maintain 800,000 in a Thai bank to get the 1 year extensions of an O visa.

You could go ahead and get an OA visa. An OA visa will require you to maintain Thai health insurance for the visa and subsequent extensions. You can qualify for this visa with funds in your US bank accounts but extensions of this visa will require 800,000 baht in a Thai bank. It is a one year visa that, like the O visa, can be extended 1 year at a time indefinitely.

The OA does have a weird benefit that if you leave and return within the first year of the visa you will be stamped in for a full year (or until the end of your insurance policy). This means if you time it right and you have the insurance you can get almost 2 years on an OA visa before you have to start extending it in Thailand or return to the US to apply for a new OA visa.

@Nongnuch *******

You are really wasting a lot of text on me. Time to move on.

@Nongnuch *******

I know how to get rid of an OA. I’ve seen Tod address this issue with the opposite results you describe. I’ll go with whatever Tod says but I suspect the OP will go with a non-O to begin with. That’s what I would suggest these days. I went from my OA to an LTR a year ago.