I bought my friend's family21 rai of riceland in February. The land is about 1 1/4 hour outside of Udon Thani. It cost 400 000 baht. Is this a resonable price to pay for land with a large pond?

Also they have told me that they could not plant rice this year because the rains were too late. Can anyone confirm if this is true?

I am currently in Australia so find it difficult to find out this information.

I hope this isn't true for you,but I have seen this situation happen twice ,where the falang bought land already owned by the family!

I don't see where he said he bought land already owned by the family. Quote
I bought my friends family,21 rai etcc.He simply bought 21 rai of land. Yes the average price for agriculture land without developement potential, is about 20,000bht per rai in most areas..
The rice planting was late this year due to a prolonged dry spell, but most farmers eventually got it sowed, however its not been a good crop in most places so you can expect to see a huge price increase soon. Already coneoaw, sticky rice is in short supply and the price has doubled in the shops.
The land ownership however is a totally different ball game On which I don't wish to comment.

all depends on where it is near the main road our not our near red road our not water our not
if your land is near main road our a short distance and with water yes you have a correct price
our land i paid for 15000 per rai with water stream passing buy not far from red road also near main road
i could buy at 10000 per rai near red road no water unless you put a bore hole down cost 3 to 4000 with pipe pump extra
then there is even land to be found 7000 per rai no water far from main road and dirt track off red road
as you can see its hard to say what it should cost
then if you have no land deed it should cost 0

It has a huge waterhole, covering about 1/5 of the total area, I formed a compay to buy it and used a lawyer from Pattaya who specializes in this. It has been registered in Udon Thani and I have a copy of the registration, yes I got it checked out with someone who speaks Thai here in OZ and the name of my company is on the registration. Only concern is that what is going on with companies formed by foreigners to buy land, but that is another matter. It has been fenced since purchase, my friend's family saying it cost them
40 000 to do this. Would this be about right? Anyway thanks for your help.

if you are happy, then you got a good price. as previous posters say it depends on the details. a similar plot in phuket would be sixty million baht. my own 5 rai plot 15 km south of udon cost 400,000. we have concrete road electric and town water. i'm happy with that and we are surrounded by close family. you can pay 10,000 to 200,000 per rai depending on details in isaan.

The prices for both the land and the fence sound like they are in the ballpark.

Maybe the land is bordered by roads and therefor not require fencing to define boundaries.

It is impossible to fence 21 rai of land for 40,000 Baht as that equates to 800 metres of fencing and a budget of only 50 Baht a metre.Barbed wire cost on its own with no posts is 50 Baht a metre and link fencing 100 Baht a metre.Add the cost of posts and you are talking a hundred thousand Baht at the least and that is with small posts at four metre intervals.

john2005 wrote:I cannot believe they have fenced the whole 21 rai as 40,000 Baht is too cheap.It works out to 50 Baht a metre and the wire alone costs that.Chain link is about 100 Baht a metre and that too is without the cost of the posts.Must be a few strands of barbed wire amd small posts on a smaller area as the last decent posts i bought were 150 Baht a metre height.

Mathmatics not my strong point
but I calculate that one rai is 1,600sq mtr so 21 rai would be 33,600 sq mtrs, border size. ie 21x40=840 mtrs wide, plus 40 depth = 880 mtrs, presuming the fencing is alround, back and front, you would have a total run of 1,760 mtrs length. Which at a cost of 40,000bht would mean one metre length costs
just under 23 bht a metre. Not possible. If you placed the posts, 1 mtr high, every 2 mtrs apart, you would need 880 posts, then if you used barbed wire in three strands per mtr, you would use 5280 mtrs52 rolls of 100mtr@ 300bht
meaning the posts were only about 40bht each. It could be they chopped all the trees down and used them as posts, then its possible.

Whit out knowing the length of fence installed it's pure speculation. From what little I know it seems Thais install fences to establish boundaries as opposed to keeping some(one)thing in or out. Depending on the physical circumstances it may have required very little fencing.

Well my frien has sent me a picture of some of the fencing, it is not exactly the sturdiest of structures. Ireckon it won't last more than six years.
anyway I am wondering if you people could help me with another enquiry.
My friend has just sent me an email asking me to send a "western union" because he wants to grow eucalyptus trees. What on Earth would they want to grow eucalyptus tree for? firewood? According to him many people in the area are growing Eucalyptus. I have asked him not to. I've heard that it can permanently damage the land. Is there much rubber or palm oil being grown around Udon Thani?I can remember there being quite a bit of sugar cane in february, but can't think I saw much of the other, but then I probably wouldn't recognise it if I saw it.

In January I have budgeted to spend 50,000 baht on the farm. Would this amount be enough to adaquately plant about 11 rai with either rubber or palm oil?
Thanks

Well my frien has sent me a picture of some of the fencing, it is not exactly the sturdiest of structures. Ireckon it won't last more than six years.

So does it surround the whole 21 rai?Do you know?

As for palm we do not have the soil type or rainfall it requires to be commercially viable.People do grow rubber but it grows too slowly for anything like a good return.There are some rubber threads if you do a search.

Yes, rainfall was partly a problem this year. Many farmers where worrying about there income. The rain came quite late in several areas, like Baan Nong Hai, but was nevertheless very sufficient.
All of my friend’s paddies are looking presently very good indeed. Necessary preparations for a very good harvest in December are all on the way already. The crops are perfectly full.

Farang farming in Thailand is a very iffy thing to do. Even with a Thai company it is not allowed for foreigners to do!. Be careful.

The price for the land was OK, maybe more a bargain – if there is no trouble.
But for sure, you will probably never own the land in real, just on paper.

Good luck.

I understand gum trees are grown to use as pulp at the paper and particle board factories. I know one Thai family in Ban Dung who have large holdings planted purely with gum trees. They harvest at about 4 years old I think and the tree suckers from the remaining stump for the next crop.

John