Short-term rental in Thailand: what the law actually allows
This is the least comfortable conversation in my work. Almost every investment presentation on Phuket is built on a nightly rate, and Thai law is arranged so that letting for less than thirty days is lawful only in some buildings. Here is where the line runs, what crossing it costs, and how to build a return calculation you will not have to redo.
The line is thirty days
The Hotel Act B.E. 2547 (2004) defines a hotel as a business providing temporary accommodation for payment. From that definition comes the exemption everyone quotes: accommodation charged on a monthly basis or longer is not a hotel and needs no licence.
The wording matters more than it looks. The exemption attaches to the property, not to the individual booking, so a single nightly booking takes the whole building outside it. “We mostly do monthly, we just take the odd weekend” is not a mitigating circumstance. It is precisely the case the rule was written for.
What a breach costs
- Hotel Act, ss.15 and 59. Operating without a licence carries up to one year's imprisonment and/or a fine up to THB 20,000, plus THB 10,000 for every day the offence continues.
- Condominium Act, s.17/1. Running a business inside a residential condominium outside designated commercial areas is prohibited separately from the Hotel Act. The penalty is cited as up to THB 50,000 plus THB 5,000 per day.
- House rules. Many condominiums ban letting under thirty days in their own by-laws, and the juristic person enforces that itself without waiting for the state.
- Liability is not only the owner's. The person managing the property and the person marketing it are exposed too.
The eight-room exemption is not about apartments
Ministerial Regulation No. 2 B.E. 2566 took effect on 29 October 2023 and raised the threshold below which accommodation needs no hotel licence from four rooms and twenty guests to eight rooms and thirty guests. It is a real relaxation, but not an exemption from everything: the operator must notify the hotel registrar, who inspects and issues an acknowledgment.
And it is counted per building. A small villa or guesthouse fits. A single unit inside a high-rise condominium does not, because the building as a whole is far above the threshold. When this exemption is quoted to you about an apartment, it is either a mistake or a sales line.
How nightly income is lawful
- The project holds a hotel licence. Then letting through the operator's rental programme is lawful and a nightly rate belongs in the calculation.
- The licence belongs to the building, not to your unit. An individual apartment cannot hold one, so what gets checked is the project's own document: whether it is current and whether it covers your block.
- Without a licence there is one lawful format — letting for thirty days or more. That is not the end of the return: the working Phuket pattern is a licensed project let nightly in high season and switched to longer stays through the green months.
- A rental guarantee is not a licence. A developer's promise is a contractual obligation towards you, not permission from the state to let nightly.
What it changes in the numbers
Three things presentations rarely show. First, a nightly rate in an unlicensed project is not a yield, it is an exposure, and it does not belong in the model. Second, Land and Building Tax on a residential unit that is not your registered home starts at 0.02% of appraised value, while commercial — that is, hotel — use is charged at 0.30%. Third, a plain lease of immovable property is VAT-exempt, but hotel-style letting with cleaning, linen and a front desk is a service, and above THB 1.8m of annual turnover it attracts 7% VAT.
Where this stands now
Nothing has been relaxed. A draft Accommodation Act is under consultation with a small-operator tier of up to eight rooms that would in principle let apartments register for short stays, but it has not been published in the Royal Gazette and has no force. Meanwhile 2026 news reports multi-agency checks on illegal daily letting in condominiums, involving district offices, police and immigration, with platforms asked to remove listings.
What I check before a purchase
- Whether the project holds a hotel licence, which building it covers and whether it is current
- What the house rules say about letting under thirty days and about sub-letting
- Who operates the rental programme and what exactly the contract obliges them to do
- Whether the figures you were shown are built on a nightly rate or a monthly one
- How the unit performs through the monsoon months if nightly letting is only seasonally viable
In short
Asking how much a unit earns nightly, without first asking whether it may be let nightly at all, is half a calculation. I start with the second question, and sometimes the building leaves the shortlist on the answer. That is cheaper than learning the same thing a year later from the juristic person.
- Rentals on the island — if you would rather live here first and look around
- Yield calculator — run your own numbers in a minute
Legal, visa and tax work is not mine — it belongs to partners I use constantly
I am an investment strategist: I select the property, calculate the net return, check the developer and run the transaction. Anything that needs a legal, immigration or tax qualification goes to specialists I have worked with for years.
- Thai lawyers — document and contract review, land title, registration at the Land Office, wills, powers of attorney, corporate questions
- Visa partners — choosing and filing the right route for your situation: investment-based, LTR, Thailand Privilege, retirement, DTV
- Tax specialists — reporting in your country of tax residence, treaty credit for Thai tax, declarations on foreign assets
- Company formation in Thailand — when a structure is genuinely needed and lawful
- Rental management and concierge — letting the property, transfers, yachts, events
I introduce partners personally, matched to your actual question, so that you speak to the specialist who handles it rather than to a general inbox. Message me and I will make the introduction.
Frequently asked
Can I rent out my Thai condo on Airbnb?
What is the penalty for short-term rental without a hotel licence in Thailand?
Is it true that up to eight rooms need no licence?
How do I check whether a project has a hotel licence?
Lyubov Fortunova
Investment strategist and founder of Fortunova Capital Group. I have lived on Phuket for more than five years and run every deal myself: I select the property, calculate the net return, check the developer and hold the process together until the keys are handed over. Lawyers, visa and tax specialists come from my own circle.
“I count net, not dreams”
Send me the project name and I will check the hotel licence, the house rules and tell you what the figures you were shown are actually built on
I answer personally, within the working day, in any time zone. No calls unless you want them. A question about the article is free and commits you to nothing.
