Thailand Rental Law: Landlord Duties and Tenant Rights

Thai rental law has two layers. The Civil and Commercial Code governs every residential lease. On top of it, a notification of the Contract Committee, in force since 4 September 2025, turns the lease into a state-set contract when the landlord lets three or more homes. Which layer applies decides the deposit, the right to leave early and what a lease may say. This guide sets the two side by side for landlords and tenants, with the void clauses, a checklist for each kind of landlord, stamp duty and tax. It is written from the Royal Gazette, the Office of the Consumer Protection Board (OCPB) and the Revenue Department; the Code is quoted from unofficial transcriptions and translations.

Which rules apply to your lease?#

The number of homes the landlord lets decides. A landlord who lets three or more homes to people who live in them, counted together across buildings and including condo units, runs what the law calls a residential building rental business and must use OCPB's standard lease. An owner who lets one or two homes is bound only by the Civil and Commercial Code and by what the lease says.

The notification lists the homes it counts by name: "ห้องพัก บ้าน อาคารชุด อะพาร์ตเมนต์" (a room, a house, a condominium unit, an apartment), "whether in the same building or several buildings combined", including letting through electronic channels. So condo units count. Licensed dormitories and hotels are outside it, and so is a company that rents a home for its staff, because the tenant must be a person. The tenant's nationality plays no part.

The three-month cap is older than the 2025 notification: from 2019 it bound landlords with five or more homes, as Tilleke & Gibbins summarised that notification in November 2019. The 2025 text lowered the threshold to three homes, brought in letting through electronic channels, two standard forms and the 14-day route for deductions, and repealed the 2019 notification. Leases a landlord with five or more homes signed under the 2019 rules run on until they end; a landlord with three or more homes must use the standard lease for every new lease and renewal from 4 September 2025.

Security deposits in Thailand

How much landlords ask, when the deposit must come back, what may be deducted, and what to do if it does not come back.

Read the deposit guide

Every lease: the Civil and Commercial Code#

Sections 537 to 571 of the Civil and Commercial Code govern every residential lease. A lease cannot be enforced in court without written evidence signed by the party bound by it, a lease of more than three years binds for three years only unless it is registered at the Land Office, and no lease may run longer than thirty years (sections 538 and 540).

Most of the rest is default law that a lease may change. The landlord hands over the home in good repair and makes every necessary repair; the tenant takes care of it as a reasonable person would of their own and makes minor repairs (sections 546, 550 and 553). The tenant may not sublet unless the lease allows it (section 544), must let the landlord inspect "at reasonable times and intervals" (section 555) and needs permission for alterations (section 558). Splitting a long stay into back-to-back three-year leases does not avoid registration: the Supreme Court held such a chain enforceable for three years only (ruling 1564/2558).

Rent is due at the end of each period unless the lease says otherwise, so rent in advance has to be written into the lease (section 559). Before ending a lease for unpaid monthly rent, the landlord must give at least fifteen days' notice to pay (section 560). No section of the Code lets a landlord lock a tenant out or remove their belongings: the route is to terminate the lease and go to court.

Three rules decide most move-out disputes. Without a document signed by both sides recording the home's condition, the law presumes the tenant received it in good repair (section 561), which means a tenant without a condition report must prove that a defect was already there. The tenant is not liable for loss or damage from proper use (section 562). Claims about the home's condition must be brought within six months of the handback (section 563); unpaid rent can be claimed for five years. A sale does not end the lease: the buyer takes over the seller's rights and duties toward the tenant (section 569).

Landlords with three or more homes: the standard lease#

Since 4 September 2025, a landlord who lets three or more homes must use a lease with the substance of OCPB's standard form: Form A for leases of up to three years, Form B for longer ones. The lease must be in clearly legible Thai, made in two identical copies, with one handed to the tenant immediately on signing, and a signed condition report attached.

The notification sets the letters at no less than two millimetres and no more than eleven characters to the inch. The form then writes the money in. For electricity, water, phone or internet the lease states the rate, the payment period and the calculation method, and the rates may change only as the utility changes them; service charges are limited to costs actually paid and reasonable. Bills go out at least three days before the due date, and the tenant may inspect the figures behind them. Since a separate OCPB notice of 8 July 2026, a covered landlord must also display a copy of the notification and the standard form where tenants can see it.

Deposit, advance rent and the return#

The deposit (เงินประกัน) secures damage the tenant causes and unpaid charges other than rent; the advance rent (ค่าเช่าล่วงหน้า) secures rent and can be used as the last month. Together they may not exceed three months' rent; for a Form B lease with rent set yearly, one year's rent. There is no separate cap on the deposit alone, so two months' deposit plus one month's advance is lawful, and so is three plus nothing. A one-year lease is a Form A lease, so a full year's rent in advance breaks the cap.

When the lease ends the deposit is due at once, unless the landlord wants to inspect. With no damage, it comes back within seven days of the lease ending and the landlord getting the home back. With damage, the landlord may deduct the repair costs it actually incurs and returns the rest within fourteen days, but never for normal use, normal wear, damage that is not the tenant's fault or force majeure. The landlord pays the cost of sending the money, by the method the tenant names.

Repairs, entry, leaving and ending the lease#

The landlord makes every necessary repair, minor ones aside, and if a serious defect is not fixed within a reasonable time after notice, the tenant may end the lease. The landlord may not inspect without advance notice except in an emergency; the notification sets no minimum period. The tenant may leave after living there at least half the term, with thirty days' written notice and nothing owed; rent paid ahead for later months comes back within seven days, and the deposit cannot be kept merely because the tenant left this way. The landlord may end the lease only for a material breach, after written notice giving at least thirty days to put it right, seven days for conduct that directly disturbs other tenants, and without notice only for breaking laws on public order or good morals.

The void clauses#

Item 6 of the notification lists the clauses a covered lease must not use, "or any clause of a similar meaning". Under the Consumer Protection Act such a clause is treated as absent and the standard form's own term applies, so the lease itself stays valid.

Late-payment charges, automatic renewal, cleaning fees and bans on pets or subletting are not on the list. They are lawful in principle, unless they work like a listed clause: a "late fee" that in effect keeps the deposit falls under item 4.

The penalty, and OCPB's sample#

A landlord with three or more homes who does not hand over a lawful lease at signing faces up to one year in prison, a fine of up to ฿200,000, or both (Consumer Protection Act, section 57, as amended in 2019). We found no prosecution of a landlord under the 2025 notification by 25 October 2026; OCPB's enforcement has run as inspections, aimed mostly at utility charges around universities. By May 2026 OCPB had received 1,655 rental complaints, with deposits kept unfairly the most common and utility overcharging second, as reported by Thairath.

OCPB's filled-in sample of Form A prints the utility formula upside down: units on the bill divided by the amount on the bill. The right way, which OCPB's own leaflet on the same page shows, is the bill's total divided by its units, times the units the tenant used: a bill of ฿54,848.63 for 11,237 units gives ฿4.88 a unit, and 100 units cost ฿488. The notification itself sets no baht figure; its test is what the utility charges the landlord.

Electricity bills in Thailand

PEA's rates, what a month costs, and what a landlord may charge you per unit.

Read the electricity guide

Landlords with one or two homes#

An owner who lets one or two homes, the common case for a Chiang Mai condo owner, is bound by the Civil and Commercial Code alone, and the Code has no deposit rule. The amount, the return deadline, early exit and the deductions are whatever the lease says.

Three things still protect the tenant. No charge may be made for damage from proper use (section 562). A deposit held after it falls due is a money debt that bears default interest, the Supreme Court held in ruling 188/2545. And a court may be able to reduce a clause that keeps the whole deposit as an excessive penalty, although no ruling on residential deposits has settled this. In any lease, a clause excusing the landlord from injury caused intentionally or negligently is unenforceable (Unfair Contract Terms Act, section 8).

Nothing stops a smaller landlord from using OCPB's form voluntarily: it is free, and it settles in advance the deposit and utility questions that most rental complaints are about. At the least, write in the deposit and advance as separate sums, a return period with itemised deductions, how utilities are calculated, the notice to end the lease, and a signed condition report.

Stamp duty, registration and tax#

A lease pays stamp duty of ฿1 for every ฿1,000 of the total rent over its term, owed by the landlord unless the lease puts it on the tenant. A twelve-month lease at ฿14,000 a month owes ฿168. Rent is taxable income for the landlord.

Stamps are due before or at signing. Where the total rent is ฿1,000,000 or more, the duty is paid in cash at the Revenue Department's office, before signing or within fifteen days from the day after; for a lease registered at the Land Office it is paid there, on or before the registration day. Late duty carries a surcharge that rises with time, and refusing to pay a fine of up to ฿500. An unstamped lease cannot be used as evidence in a civil case until it is stamped; stamping it later, even during a trial, cures that (Supreme Court ruling 5387/2549, published by the Revenue Department). A lease of more than three years must be registered at the Land Office to bind beyond three years, and the parties share its costs equally unless they agree otherwise.

Language, e-signatures and foreigners#

A lease between private parties need not be in Thai unless the landlord lets three or more homes, but Thai courts work in Thai. An electronically signed lease is valid if the signature reliably identifies the signer, and foreigners rent and let on the same terms as Thais.

In a lease written in Thai and another language, Thai wins where the versions differ and the parties' chosen language cannot be found (Civil and Commercial Code, section 14), so a bilingual lease that names Thai as the prevailing text suits both kinds of landlord. A court asks for a certified Thai translation of any foreign-language document, and a party who does not speak Thai brings an interpreter (Civil Procedure Code, section 46). Under the Electronic Transactions Act a record that can be retrieved unchanged counts as writing and a reliable electronic signature counts as a signature, so an e-signed lease of up to three years made on a platform with an audit trail meets section 538; a longer lease still needs registration at the Land Office to bind beyond three years.

No nationality condition appears in the Code's lease sections or in the 2025 notification; the Court of Appeal's ruling 852/2567 records a Russian national holding a registered thirty-year condo lease. A foreign condo owner lets under the same Code, the same three-home threshold and the same stamp duty, and is taxed on the rent like a Thai. The one duty only a foreign tenant brings is the residence notice the landlord files within 24 hours of the tenant moving in.

TM30 for tenants and landlords

Who files the residence notice, the online steps, and the receipt a tenant needs.

Read the TM30 guide

A lease checklist#

A lease from a landlord with three or more homes must carry every term of OCPB's form; a lease from an owner of one or two homes needs only signed writing, but is safer with the same terms written in. The tables mark what the law requires and what is advisable.

For tenants: what to ask before you sign#

Ask how many homes the landlord lets, because the answer decides your rights, and ask for a signed condition report, because without one the law presumes you received the home in good repair.

1. How many homes do you let? With three or more, every term of OCPB's form applies whatever the paper says.
2. May I have the condition report to sign, with photos, and my own copy of the lease at signing?
3. Are the deposit and the advance rent written as separate sums, and when and how does the deposit come back?
4. How are electricity and water calculated, and may I see the bill?
5. May I leave early, and on what notice?
6. Who pays the stamp duty?

Keep your signed copy, the condition report with dated photos at move-in and move-out, receipts for the deposit and advance, every bill and payment slip, written notices with their dates, and the landlord's itemised deductions. A tenant of a landlord with three or more homes can complain free of charge to OCPB on 1166, at complaint.ocpb.go.th, on LINE @ocpbconnect or at the provincial hall; a consumer case in court carries no court fees.

Renting in Thailand as a foreigner

The five steps from viewing to keys, what you pay before moving in, and typical rents in Chiang Mai.

Read the renting guide

This guide is general information about Thai law as of 25 October 2026, not legal advice. For a specific lease, ask a Thai lawyer.