Costa Rica Blog

Coffee cultivation was first undertaken on a large scale by a small group of planters shortly after Costa Rica's independence from Spain in 1821.  Earlier, in the first half of the 18^th century Costa Rica's trials with coffee were unsuccessful.  Relatively isolated, Costa Rica was on no important trade route nor was it a regular port of call. Furthermore coffee was processed in Chile and shipped to Europe where it was sold as Chilean coffee at prices which seemed exorbitantly high to the Cost Rican planters.  However in 1845 a British ship owner gave them direct access to the English market elevating Costa Rica from the country with the worst economic conditions in Central America to far surpassing the other nations in prosperity.  The British, in fact, were the principal purchasers of Costa Rican coffee until late in World War II.

Molson Coors Brewing Co. recently launched a partnership with a local importer and Coors Light is now available throughout Costa Rica. A significant portion of people in the country prefer a light beer and until now the only options have been Bavaria and Imperial Light which historically have been less than 25% fewer calories than the regular versions.  Molson Coors is trying to get a foot hold into the Central American and Caribbean markets.

Costa Rican Beer

Rental Property Research Tools:  Thinking of buying Costa Rica real estate as an investment?  When buying real estate in Costa Rica you should research first to determine if it's a wise choice.  Before you decide to build a home in any foreign country for rental income, consider the following.  Have you ever heard of http://www.vrbo.com/  This site, Vacation Rental by Owner, is a great place to find rental properties around the globe.  It is also one of the most valuable research tools available for anyone considering the purchase of property in a foreign country.  One of the best indicators of how to judge the value of a real estate investment in a foreign location is the quality of the rental market.  If a strong rental market exists, you can easily judge the quality of any investment using simple math.  Using http://www.vrbo.com/ you can find complete rental information, including rental rates as well as availability.  Each property specifies the rental rates for short term versus long term, high season or off season as well as features and photos, square footage and number of beds and baths.  It is a great tool to compare potential purchases in various foreign locations.  If the rental market in an area is good, so is the resale market.  If the rental market is weak, don't expect great returns on your investment, appreciation or a secondary market to sell down the road.  
What to Look For:  With this tool you can compare the cost of any purchase to the potential return on investment from rental income.  High rental rates and low availability is the key to solid returns and appreciation.  As an example, check out the rental activity in our town, at VRBO.  From the home page, select Cental America, then Costa Rica, in the state of Puntarenas and the town of Ojochal.  Compare our rates and bookings to any other location, Panama City, Salinas, Nicaragua, Belize, Ecuador or Mexico and see for yourself why our developments continue to outsell many others.  Look through all the listings in each area you are considering, this is what smart investors do.  You may see a few new listings that may not yet have much rental activity and there will always be some very successful renters as well as some who don't do well at all.  Use a good sample size and then compare results to the cost of purchase to figure your potential return on investment.  A good investment should always have a strong rental demand.  

The 84 year old insurance monopoly run by the Instituto Nacional de Seguros (INS) in Costa Rica is now officially open to competition.  President Oscar Arias signed the bill enacting the changes on July 22^nd. 

Amazon.com Inc. said it will open a customer service center in Heredia, Costa Rica

Some of you may have seen this article before in our newsletter but it got so many comments we thought we should put it in the blog.  Let me also mention that the "executive check up" that I had at Clinica Biblica now has the cost of the check up listed in the article. (you'll have to read a bit to find it).  This is the second article we have written on Health Tourism in Costa Rica because the subject seems to get a lot of interest from readers from the US and Canada.

Sloths (locally called perezoso which means lazy) are relatively long lived, sometimes living for more than twenty years. They spend their entire existence hanging suspended from the boughs of trees. Their limbs are long and well developed, and terminate in long curved claws that hook over and grasp the supporting bough. The animal moves by advancing one limb at a time in a slow, deliberate fashion.