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COSTA RICA REAL ESTATE
Here
at
www.limitededitionsre.com we have 24 years of complaint free
service. John Luther, SRA, is the only SRA Appraiser to our
knowledge in the Americas let alone Costa Rica. We are very
serious about our business and take great care in maintaining our
impeccable reputation. John Luther is a native New Yorker but now
a citizen of Costa Rica. Prior to the 24 years in real estate he
taught Spanish after having studied at Ohio State, the University of
the Americas in Mexico City and Santiago de Compostela in Spain.
From 1981 to 1998 he was an independent appraiser working for 35 major
banks including First Union and Chase Manhattan. During that time
his appraisals were never questioned once as to the value of a
particular property. From 1987 to 1998 he operated Hudson Land
Company on the Hudson River north of New York just opposite West Point
Military Academy. He was on the school board at the West Point
High School. In this period he served many famous clients from
New York. That fanaticism for excellence has carried over to his
work in Costa Rica.
The
truth is the fact that Limited
Editions Real Estate rejects for vast majority of properties offered to
the agency for sale for a wide variety of reasons.
When a client, for example, makes a purchase offer on a particular
property, we first go to the National Registry or “Registro Nacional”
to get a certified copy of the deed and survey. If everything
checks out ok, then the information is given out to the buyer’s
attorney to do his/her own discovery on the property. This has
the effect of minimizing legal costs while at the same time giving
additional scrutiny to the property. By the way, there is no
licensing of real estate agents in Costa Rica and it is common practice
that anyone including taxi cab drivers sell real estate. The
caveat here is “buyer beware”.
We are very serious
about our business and would hope that our customers would be equally
serious. We tire of the client who is making decisions
about Costa Rica Real Estate from the United States and Canada after
having read a guide book or an English speaking newspaper. One
major English speaking newspaper carried a headline last year stating
that the Costa Ricans were opposed to U.S. Coast Guard boats and
warships being in their ports. A lot of fuss over nothing.
The final vote was 48 to 1 in favor and the one negative vote was by a
Costa Rican Congressman or “diputado” who the locals think is
crazy. We get many requests for information that we feel that we
consider unreasonable. For example, those interested in a
particular hotel property might ask for 5 years of audited statements
of the financial records for that hotel. First of all, no one
would give out such information in the U.S. or Canada to a complete
stranger; one the agency has never met. Second, many of our
commercial property owners including hotels have requested that we not
give out such information for fear of losing key employees should they
become aware that the property was being offered for sale.
In
evaluating hotels, for example, just like in the United States that
hotel needs to pass the litmus test. Not only is the key
information extracted from the owners but also from the employees of
that hotel. Often the employees are not even aware that we are
making critical judgments about that property. We will ask the
maid how many rooms she clean last night or the desk attendant how many
rooms he/she rented last night. The
evaluation of that property is continual and may stretch over several
years. Each month or so, we stop in to see the property
and make casual but concise evaluations. This information is then
placed in our extensive data base and compared with other hotels in the
same area along with others in other areas in both the high and low
season. We then determine probable sale price by the net income
that the property produces. Gross income is somewhat easy to
estimate but expenses and expense ratios take a real professional to
evaluate.
Unfortunately, up to 95%
of the inquiries that we receive are from customers who are merely
fantasizing and surfing the web. We attempt to treat
all inquiries as serious inquiries. Your own litmus test of us
should at least include how fast we respond to your inquiry. That
in itself will initially separate us from the rest. To
distinguish yourself as a serious customer we ask that you INDICATE THE ARRIVAL DATE IN COSTA RICA AND SET
UP AN APPOINTMENT at least two weeks in advance. In that way we can devote the time and
attention that the serious customer deserves.
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