Costa Rica-Real Estate Condos for sale in Guanacaste

Sasha Campbell is a well known singer and performer here in Costa Rica who has worked hard to launch her career and a few months ago moved to USA to continue looking for the fame and recognition she deserves.

With a sweet and lovely voice the young performer took a chance and sent all her material to the very well known Irish band U2 and her efforts paid up: Sasha Campbell will be performing with the band during their 2009-2010 world tour in 250 concerts in many different locations such as Ireland, Brazil and Asia. To the exciting news all she could do was scream and jump.

In Costa Rica, arts locally are not taken so seriously and although there is a small group of people who follow them and support them it is really hard to see a Costa Rica performer go that far. Sasha Campbell does have the talent to that talent in Costa Rica is serious and impressive. Other great performers from who had made international appearances are the MTV Latino winners Le Pop, the metal band Sight of Emptiness who played in Europe and Gandhi who has been part of the music scene for over 12 years now.

It is very rewarding to see a Costa Rica performer prove that there is more than tourism here and put the name of the country out there, I really hope she has a blast during this tour with U2 and other bands and artists in Costa Rica work as hard as her to make their dreams come true, after all how many people can say they were chosen by Bono himself to perform in a world tour with U2?

UPDATE: The Costa Rica artist was scammed by a false publicist who actually has several issues with U2’s label. Sasha Campbell will not be performing with U2 at least for the moment.

Yesterday I watched a documentary on what exactly caused the financial crisis and how it affects the real estate market. Costa Rica has begun a slow transition into these recession times which has been as good as it gets, yet people have started to get worried.

Apparently the whole credit crisis not only is affecting everyone, since home owners and investors made terrible financial choices: in one hand the real estate investors want more money ad the banks need mortgages to buy and sell so they just gave home loans to people who were not really the capacity of paying their debt, therefore their properties are foreclosed. When a bank or financial entity has too many foreclosures and not so many paying customers there is really nothing they can do, so other investors leave them hanging with undervalued properties in foreclosure that are not really good for anything.

People no longer own their homes, banks are not receiving money, investors are not seeing their investments work therefore there is really nothing beneficial to anyone going on. Costa Rica real estate did not see that issue coming as big as it is since banks were usually very careful about home loans and mortgages, but not anymore. In Guanacaste for instance, getting a home loan for a local is close to impossible, since it translates into several trips to San Jose and loads of paper work, most people just rather deal with private investors and companies to make things easier for them, although the price is much higher.

As you can see, not only the real estate market in Costa Rica is having it rough, this same credit crisis is the one affecting the United States and all the little countries that are under its wings as well. I just wanted to share some financial knowledge with all of you, hope it helps.

So today I sent back the blue prints the architects sent me a few days ago with a couple of changes. I have to admit that they did an awesome work putting together everything I have thought of in paper, yet after looking at it I realized a few things needed to be a bit different to work better. Building a housing project in Guanacaste is definitely an interesting experience.

A few years ago Guanacaste was a normal rural area in Costa Rica, beach related town with country people, hard land workers mostly, yet after the tourism business grew in the area and more and people started investing in small vacations villas and huge luxury hotels, Costa Rica grew its economy with it. Liberia then had an international airport and the amount of visitors increased relentlessly.

The good thing is that since the beginning, real estate developers in Costa Rica were clear on the ecological preservation issue and have been trying to keep the place clean and the national reservations of Guanacaste untouched. The province has sure grown into a main city, but the beauty of the place is still the main attraction. My housing project in Guanacaste is part of that now and I want it to be an addition to the pristine scenery of the area, not ruin it.

I like the place I live in, Guanacaste has brought peace into my life and a new way seeing retirement, I feel part of the nature, the people and the traditions and those are important things in life, I want to offer that other people relocating to Guanacaste and not mess with it, therefore the changes I sent to the architects were definitely necessary, I truly hope they understand the reasons I have to make them.

I was sitting yesterday with my friends that are planning on relocating to Costa Rica and I was surprised to hear them talk about how cheap they though real estate in Costa Rica is, it made me think about myself a couple of years ago when I started my own relocating adventure.

And their thoughts about buying property in Guanacaste are definitely similar to what mine were: I was happy to be able to buy a beautiful luxury villa near the beach at a low price, a price so low that back home it would have meant that I was able to buy a modest home in a fairly nice neighborhood. Relocating to Costa Rica was not that hard and to be honest I enjoyed the whole experience and learned a lot.

But there is something that after living in Costa Rica for a while and after making friends that are Ticos I have to admit bothers me incredibly: Locals just cannot afford a home in this country, real estate in Costa Rica is not regulated at all and people do charge impressively high sums of money for real estate, the worst part is that us gringos are the ones that can afford those prices and pay them like it is nothing, allowing this to happen.

I told my friends they should do I what I did and negotiate the properties for sale they find interesting for less money than the asking price, recession times do not help bring many real estate investors and they need to learn that we are not the stupid gringos they think we are and if we are planning on relocating to Costa Rica that would be the best way to start helping our new community: moving to Costa Rica? Start living like a Tico then…

The very famous Manuel Antonio National Park, where some of the most beautiful Costa Rica beaches are besides Guanacaste has closed its doors during this weekend. Manuel Antonio is the second-most-visited park in Costa Rica, attracting thousands of visitors every year, it is one of the most precious ecological reservations in Costa Rica, providing home to several animal species and plants.

Closure order for Manuel Antonio National Park was issued on February 12^th, providing 10 full days for the Environment and Energy Ministry to correct a terrible waste water problem that was affecting the beaches nearby, the problem was not solved therefore the park was closed until further notice, the first step to have the Costa Rica biological reserve open will be building a wastewater treatment plant.

Administrative personnel of the Manuel Antonio National park claimed that although the problem was identified a year ago, they had not allocated enough money to deal with it, causing the closure of the park.

I personally have been at the park twice since I have been living in Costa Rica; it is a splendid ecological reservation, in Costa Rica, probably one of the top three if you ask me. The whole closure is really sad and I certainly hope they can find a way to come up with the money to build the treatment plant soon, otherwise the beautiful “mirador” and the five unique beaches of the area will be out of reach for a long time.

According to the park managers admission fees to Manuel Antonio National Park totaled $1.81 million during last year and were used mainly to pay salaries and provide basic services. Again the financial crisis hits Costa Rica.

The former Pizza monster in Costa Rica Domino’s Pizza has now appeared and has promised to pay up the 122 former employers that left out on the street a couple of weeks ago.

People in Costa Rica were furious with the way the company closed its business by fooling employees into turning their restaurant keys due to a Health Ministry check up that was supposed to take place the next day, unfortunately the next day all employees arrived to their workplaces to find a dismantled location and no one to provide explanations at all.

Apparently they have set up a pay up system: former Domino’s employees that are owed less than 200 000 colones will receive all their money today, those who are owed more than 200 000 and up to 400 000 will get their money in two monthly payments and those who are owed more than that will receive their money in three payments. Thank God there is not a Domino’s Pizza in Guanacaste.

The way these people handled their financial crisis is really unprofessional, workers in Costa Rica don’t make as much money as workers in the US and they deserved to be treated fair and with dignity, hopefully all these people can find a job soon, although in Costa Rica, financial crisis hasn’t really meant loads of lay offs, some companies are cutting out on expenses and hiring is really not one of their priorities right now.

In my opinion they shouldn’t trust Domino’s Costa Rica and should get everything in writing, I foresee that the ones receiving all their money are going to be the ones that get paid up in full today; the rest will not see their full amounts. Domino’s Pizza really went far hear, the majority of businesses in Costa Rica are extremely serious and wouldn’t pull such a low blow to their employees. 

I think I never really got the chance to explain to you how I managed to drove around Guanacaste and find a nice property for my housing project. To be honest we left that morning without a clue of where we were heading, another thing we noticed is that most properties for sale in Guanacaste do not have any signs at all, so after a couple of hours of just driving around we came up with a solution: ask around.

Whenever we saw a good piece of land that seemed remotely interesting we just drove towards the next grocery store, house or gas station and asked about the property, since everyone in Guanacaste is so friendly they all pointed us out to the correct direction. Real estate agents in Guanacaste work very casual and it is nice to deal with such lay back people.

One of the properties for sale I liked I even got the owner’s phone number, left a message since it was the holidays and a few days later I received a call from a Guanacaste realtor asking if I was still interested in the property. Guanacaste is big and I couldn’t even remember which of the properties for sale in Guanacaste (all of it) was the one he was referring to.

After a few visits to a couple of different properties I made my decision, I am happy to announce that I have received the first design drafts from the architects today! I haven’t got a chance to sit peacefully and look at them, but just the fact that they are here gets me all excited. Hopefully this will work out nicely and I won’t have to go all the way to San Jose anytime soon.

Yesterday as me and the wife went out for nice walk on the beach in the afternoon in Tamarindo we ran into some old friends from back home and ended up having dinner with them. Apparently they have been renting a nice small villa in Guanacaste for the past week and are actually here not only on vacations, but also planning on moving here for good.

When I heard this I had to let them know about all the work I have been doing learning about Costa Rica real estate and how much I have accomplished with my Guanacaste housing project that although is still in diapers, has me very excited. They told us that they first wanted to travel, Costa Rica was their second destination so far, but apparently they have been feeling so comfortable, they are considering Costa Rica as their retirement place. It was very similar to the day me and my family arrived into our first Costa Rica hotel and decided that we will be much more comfortable in a villa, so we rented a Villa in Tamarindo, of course the first place we stayed at was not Guanacaste, Costa Rica appear so beautiful we had to stay longer than expected.

A couple of months later I negotiated with the villa owner and made my first Costa Rica real estate deal ever, and bough the villa we were renting, our vacations were no longer vacations, it was a change of lifestyle, which I had to admit, I wanted to change and that was on my mind the entire time, we came to Costa Rica to explore the possibilities of staying and we did, no more stress or travel. Costa Rica welcomes you like not other place and apparently my friends felt the same way.

And again China comes to the rescue in the economic trouble Costa Rica gets into, apparently a total of $300 million in internal debt bonds were purchased by China as part of agreements to open diplomatic relations, after San Jose in broke 60 years of relations with Taiwan.

Don’t get me wrong, these are great news for Costa Rica, San Jose especially since most of the benefits will be going to that province. At this moment there are hundreds of Chinese workers living in San Jose temporarily to begin the construction of the Estadio Nacional in La Sabana. Also, China helped built the long boulevard that goes all the way trough San Jose downtown and will develop some sort of China town in Costa Rica near the Paseo Estudiantes, where there are already several Chinese stores and restaurants.

I actually think a China town is necessary anywhere in the world: the culture is colorful and the food is amazing, so Costa Rica is winning with that inclusion; another thing is that San Jose was becoming a dark, smelly and boring place and after all these changes take place the view of the Costa Rica capital city will improve a lot and it will no longer be the hideous place it was a few years ago. Another positive thing is that with the free trade agreement Costa Rica – China will mean that a lot of more products will be accessible to low income families and that is always a plus. 

According to the Banco Central de Costa Rica (the main banking entity in Costa Rica) the country has officially entered recession times and people should start taking stronger measures not to be affected by the financial crisis. This actually makes me proud of the country that has accepted as a citizen…while the United Estates fell hard in to recession Costa Rica financial status maintain itself floating nicely for a lot more time the financial entities in Costa Rica actually alert the citizens before hand, I wonder which is the developed country now?

Everything started actually this year when some of the biggest companies in Costa Rica started making small lay offs, some Guanacaste hotels did cut off some expenses but that was not an issue caused by the recession at all, it was just the beginning of the low season in tourism only, anyways Guanacaste beaches have always been one of the favorite tropical destinations so, I find it really hard to see them go down anytime soon.

I have actually been telling you that the real estate market in Guanacaste, well, in Costa Rica has been doing good on rentals mostly for the past few months, people are not getting home loans, and also some of them have been losing their homes, probably not as often as they are in USA but they are and investors are making money out of this everyday.

I really hope people listen to the recommendations the BCCR is giving, it would be really sad to see the beautiful people in Costa Rica struggle as much as the North Americans are right now, they had to see it coming so hopefully they will do ok.