The popularity of condos in the booming Guanacaste region in Costa
Rica has spawned a new industry for local residents and entrepreneurs.
As the tiny villages along the coast trade in their wilderness for
billion dollar investments, locals are trading old jobs for marketing
kits and tool belts.
In the wake of the boom, property management
services have been springing up to satisfy the needs of absentee
property owners who want to rent their homes to tourists as vacation
properties.
Since development on the $400 million Peninsula Papagayo project
began in 1997, construction and real estate sales in Costa Rica's
Guanacaste region have been on a roll.
According to Costa Rica's Central Bank, big business foreign investment
in real estate has nearly tripled in the past 12 months - most of it in
Guanacaste. The majority of these purchases
represent investments in the tourism industry with large scale hotels,
developments and existing tourism businesses being snapped up by savvy
entrepreneurs.
But not all investment in the tourism industry represents big
business. Individuals and families attracted by the climate and natural
beauty of the area are getting in on the action. Discovering that
condominiums make fantastic and affordable vacation homes while
providing a viable source of income, people from all over the world are
buying up condos in the country. But managing a property when you are
out of the country is next to impossible and leaving your vacation home
unoccupied for months is downright risky. Absentee owners can return to
find they've been robbed or even worse - that their property is being
inhabited by squatters.
Many condominium projects address this problem directly by providing
property management services as part of the deal at buy-in. Owners can
enter their property into the project's rental program and have their
interests taken care of. Depending on what level of involvement you
wish to have, property management companies will take care of
everything - from security to housekeeping. For a monthly fee, you can
count on your manager to be your hotelier with a complete package that
includes marketing, booking, cleaning, and maintaining the property
while on site security removes the risk of unexpected or uninvited
guests.
For more information on property management or condominiums in Costa
Rica, contact Nicholas Viale, owner of Century
21 Coastal Estates in the province of Guanacaste. Viale is a
licensed real estate agent with over ten years experience in Costa Rica real
estate. Visit the Coastal Estates team at
www.costarica1realestate.com to find the best real estate professionals
in Costa Rica.
