Koh Samui current priced

As at Aug 15 2013
Songthaew Choeng Mon to Chaweng 50 bt
Return trip 60 bt
Accom in hotel with pool, ac and cable tv 600bt
Walk 3kms from airport to Bangrak free
Bangrak to chaweng songthaew 60bt.
Choeng mon to Nathon 6 am 100 bt
Chilli basil pork with fried egg 50bt.
Noodle soup at street stall 50bt
Not many folks in Aug 2013!
Thais are suffering from downturn!

Thais are suffering from downturn!
If they are, and don't forget it is low season, they deserve it, as they have been destroying their beaches in the name of greed for years.
I for one will have no sympathy.

Air con, TV, pool, all that for 20$?

Sounds like a great deal.

Those prices are cheaper than 15 years ago. Don't go to Phanghan then, you'll be shocked, Songthaew is THB150 even if going just around the corner.

• they deserve it

Let's celebrate then.

Chilled white for me, just opened, already welcoming in the weekend.
We've even got the Thai weather here in Europe, it's been 30+ for some weeks now - up to 38 in fact.
Got the sea-substitute in the form of lots of lakes around here.
Just need to get to the garden center to sort out the palm trees lol

I will have a GT, without lime. Those greedy Thais cut down all the forests to plant those little limes.

See also this KO SAMUI PRICES THREAD. for details of costs of Ko Samui in earlier times.

QUOTE - "Songthaew is THB150 even if going just around the corner. "
------------------
Do you mean a chartered songthiew or the shared public ones ?.

Lyndy, don't know what made you state; not many folks and downturn? It's full swing high season and all hotels are full capacity booked. Since a couple of weeks actually. Dive trips are mostly fully booked days in advance.
Over to you.

It may be low season on the West coast, the Gulf islands have absolute high season in August.

#4 Let's celebrate then

I'll celerate when the last beach front concrete hotel is demolished, but I'm not holding my breath.

If I wanted high rise concrete buildings along the beach, I'd go to Spain.

• I'll celerate when the last beach front concrete hotel is demolished

How about the hundreds if not thousands of people that work in those hotels and make a living for them and their families?
Should they celebrate too?

When was the last time you visited Samui thaibeachlovers. As of today, there's a 12 meter max height allowance to build around the island. Maybe you confuse Samui with Hua Hin, Phuket or Pattaya?

#11 When I first visited Samui in the early 90s there was a good mix of accomodation from upmarket resorts to backpacker places like Charlie's. I stayed at JR Palace which was a beautiful place with a large open air restaurant made from natural materials.
However, the common thread of all the accomodation was that it was virtually invisible from the beach, and nothing was over the tree level.
So they were employing thousands of people back then without destroying the environment.

Then came the greedies and the trees went away, Charlie's went away, the prices went up and up and the buildings were completely in your face horrible concrete monstrosities.

It is possible to employ people in the tourism business without destroying the very thing that made the beach popular in the first place.

#12 Sorry about the confusion and I'll rephrase my comment to
"If I wanted concrete buildings along the beach I'd go to Spain ( or Hua Hin, Patong, Pattaya ).

Fair enough, greed has indeed damaged a lot around Thailand, not only Samui. At least the height restriction is still in place, although right now that may be going to be jeopardized.

QUOTE - "How about the hundreds if not thousands of people that work in those hotels and make a living for them and their families?
Should they celebrate too? "
------------------
A lot of them are not locals , what about the hundeds of locals that used to work and make a living running ordinary bungalows and restaurants who couldn't afford to upgrade , or who were pushed out by high rents . There are winners and losers , its simplistic to suggest its all progress and all the locals benefit . I can't count the number of times I have said that to Tools4Fools.
To take an example from Bali , the Govenor of Bali once said that upmarket tourism was in some ways killing Bali .

Dave, I'm confident that there are more locals profiting from tourism now than 1980. Plus a whole bunch of workers from other provinces.
Only a few got rich but many many more make a living and I doubt they want to loose their jobs.

Now go ahead and talk to yourself.

No response about all those who got forced off by high rents and land prices.

There was a guy selling beer in downtown Singapore in 1911 for 10 cents.
There's two scenarios to what happened to him.
Maybe you can work them out.

Doesn't matter what happened to him , as far as main Thai islands go a lot of locals running small time bungalows etc got forced out by high rents . In the case of Phuket the expensive living costs have made life difficult for locals not part of the tourist trade.

In Rimini prices have exploded since tourism took over. Luigi is not in tourism, if plants veggies - and sells them 20 more expensive than before tourism. His brother Antonio is fishing and gets now 14 Euros per kilo instead of 80 cents.

Alfredo rented out rooms in his pension for 5 Euros; he reinvested some of his profits and upgraded his rooms and even paying a higher rent he makes more money than ever as he gets now 55 for his rooms.

The only one who didn't make it was Pinocchio. He didn't upgrade his rooms, just pocketed all the money. When rents increased he couldn't cope.

Their distant cousin Lee-Berlusconi in Singapore is doing well, he inherited his grand dads pub, they pay 15'000$ rent these days but with a good crowd and at 18$ a beer he is doing wellj, just went on a holiday to Rimini.

Dave, it would be locals running small time bungalows, on who's land would these bungalows be build? How can they be run off because of higher rent? Maybe they sold their land.
Locals on Samui had land, not so much more nowadays, but that's how most of them started out.

RE# LIMBO ,
------------
At first the bungalows and other businesses were run by locals who owned the land or paid rent to local families who owned the land - not everybody owned the land , not unusual for different bungalow owners to be paying rent to the same land owner. At the beginning sea front land wasn't very valuable but later on when plans for an airport got under way and mainstream tourism was making inroads outsiders and resort companies moved in to buy land . Some locals who owned land did well , some were coerced to sell and numerous others who were renting were forced off.

QUOTE - "Locals on Samui had land, not so much more nowadays, but that's how most of them started out. ". Just to repeat again to make it clear , only SOME locals owned the land not every single bungalow operator. that had sprung up. Same thing has happened on Ko Chang , Trat province and Ko Phangan and elsewhere.
But in any case this is not an economics or job creation forum and another thing to consider is that whats happened to Samui is spilling over to Ko Phangan also - its becoming a little Ko Samui with evermore development and they are building an airport there too .
Many can accept that Thailand needs some developed tourist islands for its tourist industry and most didn't complain too much about Samui and Phuket when there were still alternatives like Ko Phangan , Ko Lanta , Ko Chang . But now just about everything is being taken over for upmarket / mainstream development . The only thing sparing some places like Little Ko Chang (near Ranong) is that the beaches are not very good.
And one other point , in times past when posters would give reports about was happening to certain beaches and islands they would be often chided with something like - " stop moaning and complaining , go find a new place !" . Well we have go to the stage where the new places have just about run out , and you not going to find another beach that looks like Chaweng or Lamai or Thong Nai Pan on whats left.
The "moaners" deserve an apology.

PICTURE Chaweng nowadays.

PICTURE Chaweng in the wooden bungalow era.

Dave, you phrased it as 'what about the hundeds of locals that used to work and make a living running ordinary bungalows and restaurants who couldn't afford to upgrade'.
Plenty of Samui families had 'useless' beach land, the good land, all located in-land was given to the 'good' kids, the black sheep of the family got the beach land that nobody really wanted.
All land originally was held by local Samui families. A lot was sold.

Just realized that PM's are disabled, do you allow me to use the two LP pix of Chaweng in the 80's for my blog?

I phrased it that way in response to to Tools4Fools comment about the hundreds of jobs created , but I didn't just say "couldn't afford to upgrade" I also added - "or who were pushed out by high rents ".
Thats right a lot was sold, but the land became even more valuable after much of it was sold , those who sold early were the losers. By the time there were lots of bungalows on the Samui beaches many of them were renting .

Thx, appreciated for the pix. Yes, not having the pm function is a bit strange, what can be the reason for that?

^^ One can only imagine the paranoia in the BBC head office when they decided to stop people PMing each other on TT.
It's a major problem, and may be a contributing factor in the reason so few people regularly use the site compared to before the great thread massacre.

It's been downhill since the massacre, that's for sure. PM's and signatures were nice tools, I can understand not wanting sig's but PM's? Back to kindergarten.

Get the impression from this THREAD that Pms not likely to come back.

Sorry however, I've been away in Bali and returned to Samui on Sept 8. I noticed prices were VERY negotiable and the beach chairs were not occupied when I was on the Nth East Coast of Samui in mid August and after I returned in September, they were less occupied and restaurant were not too full and prices for most tourist stuff was very negotiable.

When I can get an air cond room close to beach (no roads to navigate) with hot shower, cable TV, towels, soap, fridge etc. for 600 baht it's not peak season, imho. I'm talking about rooms 100 metres from the beach. Lots of hotel folks talk up the bookings etc. When one is there it's not difficult to check out the beach, restaurants, etc. and ask massage girls and shops owned by locals if they've been busy. I arrived on Samui on August 13 2013 after flying from Penang on Firefly. I spent a week there and then returned for 10 days in September from 8th. September was noticeably quiter and far less busy than August but neither month (DURING MY VISIT DATES) were busy. Nothing like February! I lived on Samui each year usually from May to November and I'm very aware of the lack of tourists at some of the less popular beaches. Houses to rent are available at 2007-2008 prices.
Good luck!