Juristic person businesses overseeing condo and office buildings are thriving, driven by the country's recovering economic, tourism and real estate growth, according to Commerce Ministry data.
Deputy Commerce Minister Napintorn Srisanpang said following the pandemic, the Thai economy has gradually improved, especially for tourism and real estate. Consumers resumed spending and had greater interest in residential investments, he said.
Land Department data indicated in the first six months of this year, more than 53,000 condo properties were transferred.
These figures reflect a growing trend of establishing juristic persons for condos and office buildings to manage shared spaces within projects allocated by property development companies or real estate businesses.
In 2020, there were 137 registered corporate condo and office building juristic person businesses with capital of 283 million baht.
In 2021, there were 150 registrations (up 9.49%) with capital of 335 million baht (up 18.4%).
In 2022, there were 300 registrations (up 100%), and in the first nine months of this year, there were 553 registrations (an increase of 166%) with registered capital of 1.79 billion baht (a gain of 195%).
This aligns with data on registered condo and land allocation permits nationwide from the Lands Department. In 2019, there were 221 registered condos and 759 land allocation permits.
In 2020, there were 151 condos (a dip of 31.7%) and 609 land allocation permits (down 19.8%).
In 2021, there were 151 condos (flat) and 793 land allocation permits (up 30.2%).
In the first nine months of this year, there were 80 condo and 555 land allocation permits.
According to Mr Napintorn, as of Sept 30 this year, there were 3,818 operating corporate condo and office building businesses in Thailand, accounting for 0.44% of all active businesses (885,521 in total), with a combined capital of 37.4 billion baht, comprising 0.17% of all active businesses in Thailand (21.5 trillion baht).
He said this juristic person business is closely related to the segments of construction, real estate, property development of condos and housing projects.
Once condos and housing projects are sold to customers, the management of shared spaces within these properties is transferred to corporate entities, termed condo or housing project juristic persons under the related Thai laws.
One of the factors driving the increased establishment of these businesses is the growth trend in real estate, said Mr Napintorn.
However, these businesses must continue to evolve to meet the changing service demands of customers, he said.
This will involve leveraging technology to reduce costs and foster business competitiveness, said Mr Napintorn.