Caroline

Wondering how should one start if I am looking to buy a single family in Costa Rica. I have been there a couple of years back and would look to have a place that we can use when travel and then rest of the time can use as vacation rentals. – Sushil We are not financial advisors or real estate agents, so we don’t give advice. However, we have written [...]

We recently moved into a condo that we had owned as a rental for 7 years. While the tenant was great (e.g., paid on time, low maintenance), the place still needs a lot of work. We also have very different tastes. I think the tenant had migraines or otherwise didn’t like light (vampire?) because the floor and walls were kept very dark. One of the first things we did upon [...]

When the pandemic upended our travel plans, I threw myself back into work so seamlessly that I figured that’s what I would do until normalcy resumed. However, as we are well into year two of the pandemic, and things seem to be getting worse, not better, I find myself rethinking my initial assumption. If travel isn’t on the horizon for years, not just months, will I simply double down on [...]

Both Scott and I turned 50 this year. Neither of us are into celebrating birthdays, and we are still in the midst of a pandemic, so we didn’t throw a big party or anything else extraordinary. I also wasn’t anticipating a mid-life crisis or other inflection point. In fact, I felt that turning age 48 was a bigger turning point for us. In the fall of that year, we became [...]

I live in Costa Rica also and I read a few of your articles.  I was wondering, Instead of investing in Costa Rica real estate, Why not become private hard money lenders yourselves?  That is what I do and it is pretty much a no-lose deal if you do it right.  Any reason why you prefer Real estate?- Dan We actually are private lenders, but only on deals in the [...]

We have a lot to update you on! We closed on two sales in July: we sold one of our two Tamarindo condos; and we sold one of our three Florida condos. We also moved from a 2-bed condo in Florida to a 3-bed, to get more space. We considered and ultimately decided not to sell another rental. Finally, we have an unexpected offer in the works for yet a [...]

We miss travel but were anxious about traveling out of the country while our kids aren’t fully launched and somehow getting stuck outside the US for an extended period. At the same time, we were anxious about how our properties were doing in Tamarindo and Langosta and just curious about how Costa Rica was doing after Covid. I had received two free airline certificates from JetBlue as part of a [...]

Photo is of a sculpture in downtown Denver - a giant bear peering into the convention center. After just over two weeks in New Mexico, visiting Albuquerque, Santa Fe and Taos, and viewing the total lunar eclipse, we drove to Denver, CO. It was a beautiful, clear Saturday, and it was so green on the way to Colorado, it reminded me of our trip to Ireland. Colorado was higher on [...]

Previous posts in this series: Planning, Heading West, Albuquerque, Viewing Eclipse After a fantastic week in Albuquerque, we headed north. We wanted to spend time in Santa Fe and Taos. Given that Taos is 2 hours north of Santa Fe and we didn't want to just cover it in just a day trip, we split the week, 4 nights in Santa Fe and 3 nights in Taos. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle [...]