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…