[QUOTEhahahaha^..^=]anyone in costa rica??
ive been checking out a couple of places there and it seems to me anyone paying big dollars for an average house in any other place is getting a bad deal compared to the real estate down there.
question is:
whats the lifestyle like?
hows the exchange rate?
can u get good phone accounts for calling Nth america?
tell me whatever there is to know if contemplating a move there
dont just tell me the good stuff I wanna hear all the dirt as well
and dont just post pictures of gorgeous sunsets - im from australia so ive woken up to enough sunsets to last a lifetime ;)[/QUOTE]
Hola!
(And Hola Mpegmaster!
I just got back and answered your ICQ - shoot a message when you got a moment!)
Briefly.. cos it would take ages to cover the lot in detail... property in CR may appear "cheap", but it's actually expensive for Latin America - but still far less than "civilized world". Property prices are already increasing at a reasonable rate (around 20+% in some places), but there are still deals. These price increases are just going to continue for the forseeable future as more and more folks want to "escape" from wherever. Around late last year Biz Weekly ranked CR in the top three countries from rising property values.
Lifestyle... depends what kind of lifestyle you want, but that is one major reason for people coming here. CR is not a place to do biz (I mean trading locally), but excellent for people who are mobile like webmasters. CR is a place to live - a playground. The people are friendly and helpful and don't appear to have the baggage usually associated with "civlized world". The cost of living is cheap in comparison. The country has several microclimates so ya can choose what temperature/environment you want to live in. The roads are crap, tho other elements more than make up for the deficiencies.
All earnings/revenue from "external sources" - such as net revenues can be pulled into the country totally tax free.
The local currency in colonnes, but the US $ is commonly accepted. There is little point in converting to local currencies, but simply retain accounts in either US$ or Euros.
On phone accounts to North America and other international calls - use Skype - it costs nada. (Around 2.5 cents to landlines in most of the world. The local phone company is a monopoly joke, but is improving - slowly.
I just spent the last month "reviewing" a fair amount of the regions (this was mainly in respect of real estate accquistion, but picked up a lot of clues on the way on other stuff). It's clear the immigration rate from North America and Europe is pumping real estate prices up fairly rapidly and landowners who have any quantities of substantial land areas are not interested in selling at this time (they just sit on it and watch values increase). We have land here already and looking to buy another area of around 1000 hectares, but that's no longer easy to do as it was 3-4 years ago.
Bottom line... CR roads and almost anything to do with the govt is a pain (just avoid dealing with the govt) - almost all other things are a substantial plus. The country has all the usual elements which are favorable like.. stability, avoidance of wars and garbage. Last year there was a shortage of around 71K hotel beds for tourism and the tourism biz is increasing yearly, so the usual "resort construction" has started increasing more. CR will, perhaps in less than 10 years be a major tourist destination (that can bring benefits and a downside). The "wealth" of the country is in it's ecology and this obviously needs to be maintained.
Right now and for the forseeable furture, CR has a lot to offer anyone who is mobile.
OK.. Enough bullshit! And still no photos of sunsets