Renting Or Buying - A Hard DecisionCosta Rica offers it all, from simple cabins on pine-covered mountains until the dream villa at the beach. High apartment buildings can be found in and near San José. Elegant town houses are located in quiet and excellent areas like Escazu. Apartments view to clean white beaches and palms.
No matter what you are looking for, you will find it in Costa Rica without problems. Renting is more expensive than in US sometimes. Prices for properties climed up in the last years. However, it is still possible to buy a small home with garden in Costa Rica for only US$ 30.000.
In Costa Rica, apartrnents and houses get rented by agencies or directly by the owner. Often, foreigners find properties by a recommedation from a friend or just by driving and looking around for signs:
- "se vende" or "for sale"
- "se alquila" or "for rent"
Furthermore, the daily newspapers, especially ,,La Nacion" has long real estate lists.
If you want to rent a house or apartment, the owner will ask you to pay the first month of rent plus one rent as security. The contracts do not have a long term, only if arranged with the owner. If you use the service of an agency, you will have to pay about one month rent as a fee. Usually, you can move in after 10 to 30 days after signing the contract. You should be able to find your place within some weeks. If you want to buy in Costa Rica, take your time, never buy too fast! In some Aparthotels, you can rent a small apartment with phone, tv, dishes and extras for about US$ 150. Some hotels offer good long term rent.
If one wants it even more cheaper, they can rent a room from a private local family. This will cost about US$ 50 per week, food and washing included. Besides, living with a Costarican family is an excellent way to learn Spanish. Most language schools can recommend some families.The furnishing of houses and apartments
Most houses and apartments have all necessary rooms: big sleeping rooms, bath room with hot water, living room, kitchen, wash room, and so on. make sure that your place comes with a phone (new lines are hard to get). Often, there is a garden or a winter garden.
Most unfurnished houses do not have a refridgerator, but apartments always have it. Showers are everywhere, bath tops a big except. Better houses are always fenced. Furnished houses are hard to find, but often even include lamps, linen, dishes and cutlery.Furnishing your home
If you think about what to bring, when you immigrate, think about it that certain things can be expensive in Costa Rica. Luxurious articles often cost twice as much as in the US. Prices for household electronics dropped down and computers are almost as cheap as at home because of the low import tax for educational reasons.
However, even if certain things can be expensive, it will be still better to buy everything in Costa Rica, instead of bringing it, because transport costs and taxes are high. Also, it can take a long time until you receive your things from the tax office.
By the way, Costa Rica produces very nice furnitures made out of nice wood. A good place to look around is Sarchi. Curtains are also reasonable priced and of good quality. Small things like hair dryers, radios, heating blankets (if needed), can be brought with your suitcases or in the hand luggage. Jewelry or silver cutlery are personal items and tax free.
If you still want to bring your things, you have several options. You can rent a container in different size and get your things shipped until your house door, or you can pack things good and send them by air mail. If you choose to send them by ship, transport costs are about US$ 3000 per container. The maximum weight is about 20 tons. If you send things by air mail, one kilogram costs between US$ 2 and US$ 5 depending the flight company. Things will arrive at the international airport in San José by airplane or in Limon in the Caribbean or Caldera at the Pacific Ocean. If you bring new items, you will need the original bill, if things are used, you need a list with the momentary value of the articles, signed by the owner, as well as a copy of your passport. All items have to be inspected in the tax office, but the owner does not need to be there. Processing time might be about 5 days.Advise: Do not take transport insurance and do not send valuable items like carpets to use the minimum tax amounts for used articles.
Prefered retirement areas
Costa Rica has 7 provinces: San José, Alajuela, Cartago, Heredia, Guanacaste, Puntarenas and Limon. The first four are located in the center of the country around the capital, Guanacaste is in the north of the country (with peninsula Nicoya), Puntarenas in the south and at the pacific coast and Limon on the Caribbean side. It depends on your life style, where you would like to live.
If you are looking for comfortable climate combined with the trouble of a city, San José and it´s surroundings or one of the other cities in the central valley might be what you need. In San José, where rent is usually a little higher, an unfurnished apartment with one bed room costs about US$ 300 per month, an apartment with 2 sleeping rooms about US$ 350 and an apartment with 3 or more sleeping rooms about US$ 500. Nice unfurnished houses with 2 sleeping rooms can be rented for about US$ 500. Prices vary much, some foreigners think they get rich fast with renting. Unfortunately, there are always some people who rent way too expensive because of not enough knowledge and because of language problems.
If you are looking for a more quiet place, you may decide for a house on one of the pine tree covered hills of the central valley. Rent and sales prices there are lower than in the capital. If you like it warm but still like the trouble of the city, you can choose Alajuela, not far from the international airport and 20 minutes from San José. Do not forget that the more you go away from San José, the cheaper the houses get.
Retired people also like the beaches. Many choose to stay along the coast of the Caribbean, south of Cahuita. However, the Pacific side is prefered, since it rains less there. They also live along the many beaches of peninsula Nicoya in Guanacaste. Others choose to live between Puntarenas and the beaches of Dominical. Manuel Antonio, one of the best beaches of the country, is also located there.
If you compare all these places, I would say that the most prefered places of retired people are the cities around San José, where prices raised much. Escazu is one of the hot spots. Ten minutes from San José, it offers a large variety of houses with nice gardens in all price ranges. Houses and apartments get built new everywhere. New settlements like Trejos Montealegre, BeIlo Horizonte and Los Laureles offer houses with large gardens. Rent goes from US$ 350 to US$ 3000 per month. Prices for houses run between US$ 50.000 and 1 million US$. Escazu has the Costa Rica Country Club and many English speaking schools and churches. To give you an imagination of how "American" Escazu is, I can tell you that there are several McDonald's next to Benetton, Shell gasoline station and many other well known companies! Escazu is getting a commercial center, being famous for its good restaurants and fashion shops. Escazu has about 40000 inhabitants, but there seem to live much less, because it covers a large area. Escazu is a good place to stay for trips in the whole country. Busses to San José leave regular and punctual and hotels are excellent. B & B is available for only about US$ 20. Food is very good and cinemas, restaurants and shopping is close. However, every place has its cons and we can not recommend to stay in Escazu because of the many robbery happening there in the last time.
More suitable, a little more west of the capital (15 min. by car), we find Santa Ana and Ciudad Colon, forming the west end of the central valley. Houses and properties are still cheap to get there. There is still plenty of room to construct and new houses get built everywhere.
Ciudad Colon is considered to be a secret tip. Especially on the hills around the city, many people built new homes enjoying the nice view down to the valley combined with the security of a life in the country. You will like the view down to the lights of the valley and to volcano Poas. The place is quiet and the atmosphere is peaceful. Population is growing because of the immigrants. You will also find places to go shopping there. PALI, a supermarket chain, opened a shop in Ciudad Colon.
The parts of the capital Rohrmoser, Pavas and Sabana are popular for the rich people of Costa Rica. Rent goes from US$ 300 up to US$ 3000 or more - the city can be reached by a walk, if necessary. There are many restaurants, fitness clubs, bars and discos.
East of the capital, we find San Pedro, five minutes from the center. It has a mixture of upper- and medium class houses, which surround the University of Costa Rica. The place gives a cosmopolitan feeling, because of the many foreign students. Rent for a room starts at US$ 200 per month.
In Heredia, 30 minutes from San José, rent for medium and upper class houses go from US$ 200 until US$ 1500 per month. A relaxing and nice place for people who have to live and work in San José.
If you do not want to be near the capital and look for beach, make sure your house has phone and a good access, water, electricity and phone. Properties near Tamarindo, Samara or Flamingo in Guanacaste, near Nosara on the peninsula Nicoya and near Manuel Antonio/Quepos are the most popular. Houses in the area of Flamingo beach vary from $50.000 until $500.000 depending the property.
Properties at the coast of the Caribbean are much cheaper. The only suitable areas are Cahuita, Puerto Viejo, Punta Uva, and Manzanillo. There and as well at the Pacific Ocean you can still find properties with several acres for only US$ 10.000, if you are willing to develope. At this moment, people construct projects for retired people, which will cover an empty space in the real estate market.Buying a house or a property and its financing
Even if rent is still affordable in Costa Rica, prices raised much in the last years. Fortunately, bargains can be still found outside of the capital. But how long? A good infra structure as well as the influence of the foreigners have caused an explosion of the prices.
This caused a stop in real estate market. There are much more offers than clients this moment, what can be your profit. Foreigners enjoy the same protection under the law of real estate as the local residents. Neither Costarican citizenship nor staying in the country is necessary to buy something. People are used to tourism, because since years it helps the country to develope. Foreigners and there money are still welcomed friendly.Here some facts you should know, before buying:
There is almost no financing. Pay cash to the owner or talk to him about financing. Loans are also available at the banks, but fees and interest will kill you. Closing costs include property sales tax, tax stamps and fees. Costs are about 5 to 6 percent of the sales price and get shared between the seller and the buyer. The sales tax depends on the declared value of the property. The fees depend on the real sales price. Now it is possible to make contracts in US$. This is a plus for the seller, since he does not need to worry about the inflation of the Colon.
Your lawyer (abogado)
Never buy a property without a competent and English speaking lawyer. There are several reasons for this. It is complicated for example to make an interest bringing investment in Costa Rica. A good lawyer knows the laws of each provinces and knows that all construction plans have to be signed by a registered engineer and confirmed by the local municipality. Also, if you buy a property at the beach, a lawyer knows that the first 50 meters at the beaches are public. Your embassy can help you with a list of lawyers or look at our list under infos.
The lawyer checks the registration in the "Registro" and informs you about what it says, the owners name, any hypothecs and so on. He will also be a helping hand to figure out the sales options.Your notary (notario)
If you decide to buy, you have to look for a notary. He is responsible for making the sales documents and for the correct registration. The notary works for both parties and should take care of the interests of both. In reality, this does not happen to often, since the notary will trust more in the person who did choose him or knows him.
If you pay for your object at once, you have the right to choose the notary. If the seller offers financing, he has the right to choose. Of course both parties can agree on a different regulation. If nothing else is decided, the notary gets choosen according to the law.
If you want to choose the notary, you should tell this to the seller during your first conversations already. Another option is to take two notaries to the closing or to take one for the sale and another to register a mortgage, if necessary, even if this possibility is much more expensive in taxes and fees.
Notaries under the civil law of Costa Rica have a big responsibility. In Costa Rica, notaries have to be lawyers before the get their license to be a notary by the upper court. This court leads the notaries and their behaves. The notary also searchs for any registered titles. He checks is the seller is registered as the true owner and permitted to sell. If there are any restrictions, he has to inform the buyer that he can accept these restrictions at the closing.
The notary has to make the sales contract. The document will get registered under a certain number in the notaries office, known as the protocol book. If the contract is signed, the notary is responsible to register the sale as fast as possible. He only has to do so, if all documents are complete and all fees are paid. In most cases, your lawyer will be your notary at the same time.Normally, you will need the following documents:
from the seller:
- a receipt that proves that all taxes are paid
- the paper of the ownership and other permissions
from both parties:
- enough money to pay all taxes and sales fees
All necessary documents and fees have to be given to the notary during or before the closing. If this is not the case, the notary is not responsible to finish registration, but he has to register the sale, if the contract was signed. The notary has the right to stop his work until he has received all the papers.
Some new laws make it difficult for both parties to overview everything. Since there are different procedures, the necessary documents can vary or additional documents can be needed. Ask your lawyer for an actual list. Passing the contract to the register, called publishing, protects the buyer, because it has priority to all documents presented later which could possibly affect the rights of the buyer.
If your lawyer is also your notary, he will read the contract again and recommend some changes if necessary to cover the wishes of both parties. In case you decide not to buy during the work of the notary, you have to pay 25 % of the amount that would have to be paid in case of a sale. Brokers usually receive 5 percent of the sales price, lawyers receive only 1.5 percent. make sure to talk to the neighbors about things like crime and that the property is not part of a nature reserve. Land is sold in square meters. The yearly property tax in Costa Rica is low, between 0,5 to 1,5 % of the registered value, which in reality is much less than the sales price.Advise: Make sure that there are no problems with squatters. There is a law in Costa Rica that says, that uninhabited land is free for use. Therefore, you should have someone to take care of your property when you are outside the country.
car from Mapache