TM30 address reporting
Reporting where a foreign national is staying. Usually the responsibility of the property owner or landlord, but the consequences land on you.
Read the TM30 guide
Moving
Your First 30 Days in Hua Hin
Handle the immediate essentials, then use your first weeks to learn the place before making long commitments.
- Last verified
- Last verified: August 2026
- Next review:
- February 2027
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- 10 min
Quick answer
Handle the things with deadlines. Postpone the things with contracts.
Address reporting, banking access, a local number and healthcare are month-one work. A long lease, a vehicle and a fixed routine are better decided in month two or three.
The first 48 hours
Short list. Nothing here is strategic.
- Sleep, and let the family adjust to the time and the heat
- A local SIM or eSIM, so you have data and a number people can use
- Cash, and a working card confirmed at a local ATM or shop
- Water, basics and a first supermarket run
- Note your exact address in English and Thai
- Check whether your arrival address has been reported for you
- Locate the nearest pharmacy, clinic and hospital
- One walk around the neighbourhood, without an agenda
What applies to you depends on your status
Immigration obligations, bank account eligibility and driving requirements vary by visa route, by office and sometimes by the individual official in front of you. Treat this page as the sequence to work through, and confirm the specifics for your own situation.
Week one: make daily life work
Payments, connectivity and orientation.
Money and connectivity
- A local mobile plan on a proper contract or top-up package
- Confirm how you will move money from home, and what it costs
- Understand the ATM fee structure for your home cards
- Start the local bank account conversation — requirements vary by branch and status
- Keep a home-country payment method working as a fallback
Orientation
- Learn the route between home, school or work, and town
- Find your everyday supermarket, market and pharmacy
- Identify the hospital you would use at night
- Note traffic at the times of day you will actually travel
- Try a few areas you have not yet considered living in
Bank accounts are not uniform
What a Thai bank asks for depends on your visa type, the branch and current bank policy: some require a long-stay visa, some a work permit, some formal proof of address. If a local account is useful for your move and your immigration status currently qualifies, this is a sensible time to start the process — but check eligibility before assuming it will happen this month.
Week two: administration and healthcare
The obligations with dates attached.
By the second week the immediate chaos has settled and it is worth going through the administrative items properly: address reporting, any immigration deadline attached to your permission to stay, and putting the recurring dates into a calendar with reminders rather than trusting memory.
This is also the point to make your insurance real: know which hospitals your policy direct-bills, what the claims process is, and what you would do at three in the morning.
Week two pass
- Address reporting handled or confirmed with your landlord
- Every immigration date in your calendar with a reminder
- Insurance policy documents saved offline on your phone
- Preferred hospital and clinic identified
- Register with a GP or clinic if you have ongoing care
- Repeat prescriptions understood locally, with generic names
- Emergency contacts written down, not only stored digitally
- Household services sorted: water, internet, waste, cleaning
Weeks three and four: from surviving to living
Routine, budget and the first real judgements about the place.
By now you know how long things take and what things cost, which makes this the right moment to test your assumptions rather than your patience. Track what you actually spend for a few weeks — the gap between a planned budget and a real one is usually in transport, eating out and electricity.
It is also the point where a routine starts to matter. Whoever in the household does not have a job or a school to structure the week needs something else to structure it, and the sooner that starts the better the first year goes.
Worth doing before the month ends
- Track real spending against your planned budget
- Revisit the neighbourhood question with a month of experience
- Decide the transport question, or extend the rental arrangement
- Join one activity, club or group
- Establish a weekday rhythm, even a loose one
- Book any medical or dental appointment you have been postponing
- Review whether your visa route still fits your plans
For the cost side, the cost of living section gives you something to compare your first month against.
The immigration administration that repeatsThree recurring obligations, depending on your status.
90-day reporting
A recurring notification of residence for those staying long-term. The date resets in ways that are easy to miscalculate.
Read the 90-day guideResidence certificate
Only if a next step needs it. Formal proof of your Thai address for tasks such as a driving licence or vehicle administration.
See how to get one in Hua HinRe-entry permits
What leaving Thailand does to your current permission to stay, and when a permit is needed before you fly.
Read the re-entry guideTax administration is conditional, not automatic
Registering for Thai tax is not a universal arrival task. But if you expect to spend 180 days or more in Thailand this calendar year, will work while you are here, or have substantial foreign income or remittances, this is a sensible moment to understand whether Thai tax administration applies to you.
The long-term housing decisionThe single decision most worth delaying.
Hua Hin changes character every couple of kilometres, and the differences that matter are the ones you cannot see on a listing: noise at night, how the road floods in the rainy season, the drive at school-run time, how far you really are from a supermarket, whether the building allows pets.
A month of short-term accommodation buys you the information to answer all of that. When you are ready, the housing guide covers how rentals work here, and the neighbourhood guide covers what each area is actually like to live in.
Before signing anything long-term
- Visit at the times of day you will actually be there
- Check mobile signal and internet speed inside the property
- Ask what the electricity bill runs to in the hot season
- Confirm what is included, and who fixes what
- Check the deposit terms and how it is returned
- Confirm pet rules in writing if they apply to you
- Ask who handles address reporting for the property
- Walk the route to school or work once, at the real time
Getting aroundRent before you buy. Always.
Whether you need a car, a scooter or neither depends entirely on where you end up living, which is precisely what you do not know yet. Renting for the first month or two costs a little more per week and saves a great deal in the wrong decision.
Driving legally is a separate question from driving practically. Check what your licence or international permit allows, how long it remains valid here, and what a Thai licence application would require — and make sure whatever you drive is properly insured, which is not the same as it being registered. The transport guide covers the options, and the driving licence guide covers the licensing side.
Month-one approach
- Rent, and change your mind cheaply.
- Learn the roads before committing to a vehicle.
- Sort licence and insurance before regular driving.
- Wear a helmet, whatever everyone else is doing.
Set up healthcare before you need itTwenty minutes now, or a bad hour later.
Decide which hospital you would use for something routine and which for an emergency, save both in your phone, and check how your policy handles each. If you take regular medication, find out early how it is prescribed and dispensed locally, and under what name.
If you have not settled your cover yet, the health insurance guide sets out the options and their exclusions.
Building a life, not just a householdThe part that decides whether you are still here in three years.
It is entirely possible to spend the first month solving problems and reach week five with a functioning house and no life in it. People who settle well in Hua Hin tend to start something social early and imperfectly — a sport, a class, a volunteering commitment, a regular coffee — rather than waiting until everything else is finished.
Hua Hin is small enough that this happens quickly once you start. Golf, tennis, cycling, running groups, language classes, community and charity work all have an established presence, and the lifestyle section is a reasonable place to look for a starting point.
What belongs in month two and beyond
Deliberately not month one.
Long-term lease
Once you know the area at every time of day.
Buying a vehicle
Once you know the routes you actually drive.
Furnishing properly
Once you know which property you are furnishing.
Shipping the rest
Once there is somewhere permanent for it to arrive.
Property purchase
Well after a year, if at all — rent first.
Business or work plans
Once you understand the local market and the permit rules.
Keep one running list of open items on your phone. In the first month the useful skill is not remembering everything — it is being able to see what is still outstanding and decide, calmly, that most of it can wait.