I’m not married yet… but will be soon.
I want to know whether an ARC holder can buy property or if you need to be a resident. I’m not sure about the ownership legalities for a resident. I’ve been told that a foreign resident can’t own over half of a business. Is this true? And if it is, does this apply to property too?
I imagine so as I’ve read that you can purchase property in the name of your spouse and then they gift you half of it after purchase.
My will be spouse signed as a garantor on a car with her cousin once and he crashed it and to make a long story short she doesn’t have a very good credit record, to say the least. Would this make securing a mortgage for her difficult? Would a bank consider my cash assets and income over her credit record?
She’s already been hounded by a debt collection agency, so could they seize money from her half of the property for payment of this outstanding debt?
Also, the deposit and the payment of the mortgage would most likely be mainly paid by me. I don’t mind her having half. She’d give me the difference if we sold anyway. Well it’s not an issue for me anyway. She should get something out of marrying me anyways. It would be harder to make her take some if we split…
But what are the general legalities and pitfalls involved in this kind of purchasing partnership?
I would suggest going to the original bank that your girlfriend cosigned with and see if she is still liable or not. There was a law that was passed that the cosigner is not forced to pay for the applicants loan. You should check to see if your girlfriend signed before or after that law was passed. You don’t have to ask your bank but another bank if you don’t feel comfortable dealing with the original bank.
If the property is signed on both your names, the bank should not be able to go after it. Unless your girlfriend cosigned after you obtained the property. But you didn’t.
To be on the safe side, verify my above statements.
Also check what other assets or debts your girlfriend signature may have signed to. Most Taiwanese parents like to put property in their sons or daughter’s name when they are eligible to own property to get the first time owner’s grant/discount.
Her name isn’t stuck to any other shady deals as the usual parental ‘guidance’ is out of the picture, so to speak, which was probably why she made the first fucked up mistake in the first place.
But in terms of verifying what you’ve said, have you got any sugeestions on where I could find this out? If talking to a lawyer is a good idea, do you know of any good ones in the Taipei area?
Could I just walk into any bank and discuss this with someone that can speak english? My Chinese isn’t good enough for this kind of conversation…
First I went to CHB and they looked at me like I was from the moon. They tried ringing people to find out if a foreigner could get a mortgage. No one knew…
So I found HSBC and was greeted few minutes later by a nice young man who told me I can get a mortgage. He also said that I have to use an ROC national as a garantor, and that if my girlfriend had only been a garantor for the car then the bank wouldn’t worry about this. If she was a joint owner then they would have a problem. It seems that they’re more interested in what kind of money I’ve got and my salary. I mean how is a foreigner going to runaway with an apartment?
And your right, because it’s in my name the collection agency who’s after my girlfriend can’t take any money from the equity on a mortgage. Still neither of them seemed to know about the change in law…
So I’m really confused about all the other information on this site about having to buy in your spouse’s name and then them having to gift you half etc…
Of course I haven’t asked how much the interest rate is yet… or other hidden pitfalls. We’ll see.
I also went out and looked at some apartments in Nei Hu yesterday which seems to be a conversation I can have in Chinese. Saw a great place but it had people die in a fire in it three years ago, and all notable people I’ve questioned have advised me against it as it’s very hard to re-sell.
You’ve bought in Nei Hu I think, if I have you as the right person. On Kangning Rd. I’m kind of limited to a 3-4 million dollar apartment. You got any advice? If I buy a place with only one bedroom does that make it harder to re-sell? It looks like I’m looking at something pretty old with no elevator if I want two bedrooms. 14-15 pings…
Any suggestions or know how on Nei Hu would be greatly appreciated.
Sounds good, Joe. If you don’t mind, keep posting as you make progress. I’d be interested to find out how your experience differs from mine and others.
A lot of times, the answers we get are not the right ones; they’re just the answers the banks/institutions we deal with give us because they lack the experience of doing things otherwise.
Good luck and keep posting; these questions affect a lot of us.
I would suggest looking into starting a relationship with HSBC. Their minimum balance is a bit high, but I’ve been told on a few occasions by their reps, that they would seriously concider mortgages for foreigners that meet all of their standard requirements for such transactions. I carry their gold MC and have never had any issues with them. Atfer attaining the card. Everytime I mention the possibility, the reps reply with the same answer.
All depends on whether or not you can carry a balance $350k for more than a year. Makes sense to me as, one really shouldn’t even think of making a real estate purchase if they can’t carry a years worth of mortgage payments out of savings.
But again, that’s just me…
Mortgages for foreigners are possible, but you are unlikely to be able to borrow as much of the amount (ie you will need a higher deposit), and you may get higher rates. For these reasons I decided it best to just get the mortgage in my wife’s name, with my MIL as guarantor. Fubon bank seemed promising. They said they had a experience getting mortgages for foreigners (Taipei, Wanhua branch). Huanan said that they could’ve helped me if I’d had 6 months of tax certificates.
Well since my wife does not work, we got the mortage and thus apartment in my name. She is still the guarantor fro me.
Went to the bank yesterday. Everything was signed. So then we got the keys yesterday afternoon, and was ready to move in ( everything in our current apartment is packed up, and is a lying here there and everwhere since we were to move this week) this weekend.
Then the lawyer( she is not a lawyer but the person who does all the legal paperwork ), phoned us late last night and advised us so as to be in the safe side, not to move in until the government approved the sale of the apartment to a foreigner. She said this may take a week.
I was so pissed at this point, :fume: since she did not tell us this beforehand. Now we have to spend another weekend living among the packed up apartment, and next week I will be out of the country, so it may be another two weeks before we move in
Anyway question is
Do the governement need to approve the sale of private residental property to foreigners? I find this strange, either a foreigner is legally allowed to buy or not. Once the bank approves the mortgage then, why does the government need to screen the whole application etc.