Costa Rica-Real Estate Condos for sale in Guanacaste

Remember how in the 1980’s lots of people made incredible profits out of business tips given through out the world? One of those tips was given by International Living an international magazine specialized in providing tips and guidance to people who want to live overseas. The tip provided by the magazine in the 1980’s was to purchase cheap properties in the northern side of Costa Rica, specifically in Guanacaste since it was a raising paradisiacal area in one of the most impressive tropical locations in the world; those who followed the advice earn big profits over the years.

Now the time has come to make great real estate business in Costa Rica again, with the current financial crisis, properties in Guanacaste are now costing less than they did two years ago, but it is estimated that the prices will go back up in a year or two, meaning that the profit in real estate in Costa Rica is just waiting to become a huge deal.

Actually lots of housing projects in Guanacaste are for sale right now and there are also lots and ocean view properties available. Other good locations for real estate investments in Costa Rica are Puntarenas and San Jose, which, although has no ocean sighting nearby, the access to every other location in the country is a lot easier from San Jose. Costa Rica real estate is definitely one of the best investments in real estate because of the beauty, the variety and the low prices available.

In Costa Rica, traffic law instates a certain day for specific car plate numbers to drive through San Jose, Capital of the country. This driving restriction was set as a solution for the excessive traffic jams seen everywhere in down town San Jose. One a day a week cars with specific car plate’s numbers are not allowed to drive through down town streets for 24 hours.

This restriction will removed for the next couple of weeks son people can go and do their Christmas shopping, visit their relatives and enjoy the holidays peacefully without any problem at all. In Costa Rica there is an excessive amount of cars and the streets in most places are certainly not built for them, excessive traffic jams are seen everyday in San Jose, Heredia and Alajuela due to this.

The restriction was removed because during the holidays lots of people go on vacation and traffic are lesser than usual, also the people in Costa Rica who don’t have vacations need to drive freely through San Jose so they can run regular Christmas errands, visit their families and enjoy the traditional Christmas celebrations all over Costa Rica.

Here in Guanacaste, Costa Rica traffic restrictions are not valid given the fact that this is mostly a tourist area and well, it would be a bit difficult for people to enjoy or plan their vacation around their traffic restrictions. While I sit here and enjoy a nice cold agua dulce and prepare for a day a the beach I am happy to see so many people truly enjoying the holidays in the Guanacaste beaches, Ticos sure know how to take advantage of their beautiful sceneries.

It is amazing how the financial crisis is really hurting everyone’s pockets even during Christmas. Lots of stores in Costa Rica are actually cutting down prices before Christmas Eve, when usually this happens right after Christmas. It is sad somehow that all these economic problems affect the industry so much, especially since in Costa Rica some stores are owned by families and they count on their holiday sales.

People in Costa Rica have cut out most expenses due to the terrible financial situation the world is going through and some companies even had to cancel their Christmas parties and bonuses for employees, but this does not bring down the energetic and spirit of the Costa Rica Christmas traditions and people just try not spend as much, yet having all the things they usually need for the rompope, tamales and pierna e’ chancho. Maybe the plates will be a bit smaller this year, but it doesn’t mean that there is not going to be a celebration.

Holidays in Costa Rica are celebrated with the family and friends, there is always a place to go, In Guanacaste, hotels are in some cases offering a Christmas dinner for tourists and ex-pats, but in my case, I am having a few friends over from the area.

Well, Ticos have already entered the Holiday mode and people are finally going crazy in the stores supermarkets all over Costa Rica, I guess aguinaldos were finally given away. Yesterday, I went to Liberia to run some errands and I have to say I haven’t seen so much people in town since I came here: buying food and doing Christmas shopping.

Another good thing is that a 12:00 pm yesterday the 2 million visitors arrived: a nice New Jersey family of seven came for two weeks to enjoy the a lovely Costa Rica holiday and now they will have twice as much fun visiting amazing Costa Rica locations for free: swimming with dolphins, going to great hotels and restaurants, traveling through Costa Rica for free has to be 3 times better.

It is very nice to see how neighbors are going strong with Costa Rica traditional holiday foods: I have eaten 3 different types of tamales so far and they have all been very good. Another thing that caught my attention is that everyone cooks pork for Christmas, but only the leg (pierna e’ chancho is how they call it) and I did get a chance to taste it a couple of days ago, it was juicy and delightful. In Guanacaste people also make tamal de elote and chorreadas which are great with sour cream.

Once you live in Costa Rica for a while you tend to get excited about the details, like a well baked home made bread or a good fresh ceviche, and before I forget, if you are visiting the Guanacaste beaches these days, make sure you have a glass of agua dulce, it just can’t get any better than that.

 These are great news for Costa Rica, and off course for the many projects that are to be developed in the Guanacaste area; as a new reservoir could make a huge difference for the future investments in the province.

The project will be known as Rio Piedras Reservoir, and it is an initiative from the Costa Rican Institute of Electricity (I.C.E) aided by the Central American Bank for Economic Integration (BCIE) It will take an approximated time of 4 years to see it completed; or more precisely, a year to evaluate the proposal and present the different reports on the subject, approve them and finally proceed to the building part that will more likely take 3 years for its completion.

The main purpose of this new reservoir initiative in Guanacaste will be to deal with the excedent water coming from the Hydro electrical reservoir Arenal (Corobici); whose currently operational procedure sends 30 cm of “unused water” per second to the sea.

And yes that is actually a lot of water

If you are wondering why is this happening? Let me give you a brief explanation, for currently when the Arenal Reservoir produces a lot of electric power, the water used in the process overflows the irrigation channels (Hence they throw it on the sea in order to protect them.) Never the less, when the reservoir’s electric production lowers, the irrigation channels suffer from lack of water; this new initiative however would change things quite a bit, as it will collect the water in order to be used for the different irrigation projects and the local community projects in Guanacaste.

Now let’s see some numbers.

The technical analysis alone will have a cost of $400.000, and once the construction company has been chosen the project will have a 3 year “deadline”

The Rio Piedras Reservoir will have a capacity of 85 cm million of water (In an area of 800 Hectares.) will give water to 200.000 people in Guanacaste, and will have an approximate cost of $20 million.

As I mentioned before, these are great news for Costa Rica and more specifically for the province of Guanacaste, with projects like this one it won’t be long to see another boom in the real estate industry in Costa Rica.

The very famous travel website Fodor’s Travel which is a division of Random House, Inc has announced their Costa Rica photography contest. The official theme of the contest is “Show Us Your Costa Rica.” The main idea of the contest is to have everyone: tourists and Costa Rica citizens share their most memorable Costa Rica pictures and the best ones will be selected to be featured in Fodor’s Costa Rica 2010 guidebook– on sale in October 2009.

Since the website is specialized in traveling, the pictures are expected to be show beautiful Costa Rica sceneries, culture and traditions and anyone interested can participate, the deadline to send the pictures is January 5^th, 2009. Among prizes, Fodor’s will be giving the winning photographer a suite of Fodor’s new full-color guidebooks and the 10 runners-up will receive two Fodor’s guidebooks of their choice, the selected pictures will also be featured in the Costa Rica guide at www.fodors.com as well.

Costa Rica has really incredible locations to take unbelievable pictures so; basically anyone who is in Costa Rica and has a camera can participate. I think the most trouble will be for the judges since I am sure the material for Costa Rica will be a lot even though the deadline is only two weeks away. Also since there are some many people coming to Costa Rica for vacations material will be plenty for sure.

For those interesting in sending their Costa Rica picture to the contest visit Fodor’s website and upload your picture as soon as possible, who knows, maybe your picture will appear in their Costa Rica travel guide.

As I advertised a few weeks ago, Costa Rica will be receiving their lucky 2 000 000 visitor this week and the ICT (Instituto Costarricense de Turismo) has arranged a warm welcome to the tourist that walks in and hits the mark.

The lucky Costa Rica vacation will be sponsored by several tourism companies and what they want is to celebrate the record set by giving the visitor the best Costa Rica experience possible: tours, free hotels, transportation, meals at well known restaurants and much more freebies to make this experience the best one for the lucky 2 000 000 Costa Rica visitor.

According to some statistics, the lucky 2 000 000 Costa Rica tourist is schedule to arrive tomorrow December 17^th at the Juan Santamaria Airport where personnel from ICT will be expecting him or her since early in the morning, so if you have and schedule flight to Costa Rica for tomorrow you might be the expected winner and will be able to enjoy the best Costa Rica vacation one can experience, all for free!

Another good thing is that if you are flying to Costa Rica, the weather could not be better meaning that you will be able to actually enjoy every tour and trip available in the area, not to mention the great holiday traditional activities in Costa Rica: El tope, the carnival, Zapote and all the cultural activities Costa Rica usually plans for these days. 

Last week a guy came out of the bank in San Jose and got followed by two robbers, when they tried to attack him, the guy shot both of them and killed them. The crime rate in Costa Rica has sky rocketed in the past couple of years, it has become so bad that the Security Minister elected for this current Costa Rica government resigned stating that she had no idea of what she was doing; the good thing is that the person that occupied her job did know what she was doing and has managed to pick up the pieces quite well.

Costa Rica is a peaceful place, don’t get me wrong, but after some “Maras” started gaining territory through Guanacaste, criminals did go on the loose and now it has become a bit of an issue. There are certain areas in Costa Rica where crime rate is higher and when you came here you should definitely avoid them, it is also recommended that if you came to Costa Rica on vacation you use the safety choice of you hotel room to keep your passport and most of your money.

Safety in Costa Rica is however taken very seriously, people have come together to create organizations to end the insecurity issues, and there are now harder punishments for even petty theft, criminals are not getting away that easily. Visiting Costa Rica is definitely the dream of many, and you will certainly enjoy your stay a lot more if you are careful if you are coming to any beach in Guanacaste or Puntarenas, do not leave your stuff unattended; if you are going to stay in San Jose avoid walking at night by yourself and do not carry all your items with you.

Today I am in San Jose doing my Christmas shopping. I decide to come here because I wanted to get an idea of how Christmas in Costa Rica is prepared and enjoy a few of the events taking place this week: the Costa Rica book fair, the Avenidazo and the Festival de la Luz.

I thought it was going to be a lot more hectic than it is and talking to some people I noticed that it is because of the financial crisis, apparently in Guanacaste you can’t really see how this has affected Costa Rica. Some friends were telling me that a lot of people have lost their jobs, so they have had to cut off some expenses and people are not going crazy in the stores as they usually do.

On the other hand the traditional activities in Costa Rica have not let me down at all: the concert I saw last night at la Antigua Aduana were quite impressive and at the book fair I bought most of my Christmas gifts which was great and one learned about the Avenidazo which I didn’t really understood and scared the hell out of me.

The greatest thing about living in Costa Rica and staying for the holidays is for sure the excessive amount of tamales one can consume, so far I have eaten 5 different types and bought a few piñitas to share with the family back in Guanacaste. Costa Rica is a very different than what a gringo like me is used to, but I have to admit I do like and enjoy these differences.

Economic Airline JetBlue will begin operations to fly to Costa Rica next March, 2009; this route will be the first one the airline opens for Central America. The airline will set 100-seat Embraer E190 jets to provide a daily route between San Jose, Costa Rica and Orlando Florida, this route will be JetBlue’s 22nd nonstop route from Orlando, while it continues opening their Latin American market which by the way will begin operations in January 29^th from Bogota, Colombia in South America to Orlando, Florida.

People who interested in experiencing this new JetBlue route to Costa Rica can start making reservations although flights are set to start in March, the company has some nice introduction offers with tickets priced below $100 in some cases, meaning that a Costa Rica vacation is now even closer than ever.

Another good thing about this new flights to Costa Rica is that by the time JetBlue begins operations summer time in Costa Rica is at its best, so you can now sit an enjoy in a lovely Guanacaste Beach for way less than you would right now, also the prices in hotels a way cheaper during these days because of the green season in Costa Rica.

These cheap flights to Costa Rica are also a good opportunity for those foreigners investing in real estate since it would cost less to come and check on properties in Costa Rica or keep an eye on any development project you may have.