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Home Retirement/Living

Twenty Questions To Know The Answers To Before You Purchase Real Estate In A Foreign Country

Kathleen Peddicord by Kathleen Peddicord
Jul 31, 2009
in Retirement/Living
0
Spain qualifies overall as a great destination for buying property overseas. - Tossa de Mar, Catalonia
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Twenty Questions To Know The Answers To Before You Purchase Real Estate In A Foreign Country

Before you invest in a piece of real estate in another country, be sure you know the answers to these questions (because you can’t take any of these things for granted):

  1. What is the drive time from the nearest airport?
  1. What is your access and right-of-way?
  1. Is the property accessible year-round, including in the rainy (sometimes called the “winter”) season?
  1. Where is the nearest medical care facility? Nearest hospital?
  1. Is there enough water and water pressure? Is there hot water?
  1. What distance are you from day-to-day services (grocery stores, dry cleaners, pharmacies, banks, etc.)?
  1. Will you need a car living in this place? Does your budget allow for a car?
  1. What’s included with the property? In Argentina and Panama, for example, when you buy a home, you buy bare, stripped walls and empty rooms–no lighting fixtures, no appliances.
  1. Can you buy title insurance for the property from a reputable title insurance company?

If you’re buying into a private development, also confirm:

  1. How will security be provided?
  1. Is there a building requirement? What is it? Does it fit with your retirement timeframe and plan?
  1. What construction and design standards are in place? Zoning is almost non-existent in Latin America. If you’re buying into a private development, you want building covenants.
  1. What is the current, existing infrastructure? Understand what’s planned but understand, as well, that you’re buying only what you see. Promised infrastructure doesn’t always materialize.
  1. Likewise, understand what amenities exist and what amenities are promised but, again, recognize that you’re buying only what exists. If there’s no marina when you buy, there may never be a marina, no matter what the developer’s brochures and watercolor renderings may indicate.
  1. What are the plans for a Home Owner’s Association? What will the monthly fees be? Are these enough to cover the developer’s responsibilities? You don’t want to pay high HOA fees, of course, but neither do you want to invest in a development where the developer has so underestimated his costs that the HOA fees don’t cover them. The result can be that essential maintenance and services (for example, security) are reduced.
  1. Is the development company financially sound? Do they have a track record? What else have they built?

If you’re buying land with the intention of building your own home:

  1. Will you be in the country during construction? If not, how will you manage the building process from thousands of miles away? Who will oversee the work for you?
  1. What’s your timeline and budget? What are your contingency plans if the project takes longer and costs more than you’re planning? (It will. Take my word for it.)

If your plan is to live in the place only part of the year:

  1. Who will look after the property while you’re away? At what expense?
  1. Will you be able to rent the place out while you’re elsewhere? If you buy somewhere with a reliable rental trade, you could earn enough in rental income during the months you’re living elsewhere to cover the property’s annual carrying costs.

The markets of Latin America, the Caribbean, and Asia are unregulated. When it comes to the purchase of real estate, this is the Wild West. Anyone can be a property agent, and sometimes it will seem as though everyone is.

In places like Nicaragua, Panama, Ecuador, and the Dominican Republic, every guy you meet in a bar is going to try to sell you a house…or a beachfront lot. Assume that he’s not a licensed agent. And don’t take for granted that he owns or legally represents the piece of property in question.

Don’t be scared off by this fact, simply accept it. Make no assumptions and take nothing on faith. You don’t have the safety nets that you have when buying real estate in the United States, for example, nor the process checks and balances.

Your best defense is your own attorney. Engage one who speaks fluent English and who has experience helping foreign buyers navigate the local property purchase process. Don’t use the attorney of the seller or the developer you’re buying from. His attorney works for him. You want to find an independent attorney who works for you.

The best way to accomplish this is through expat referrals. Ask every expat you meet in any country where you’re considering a real estate purchase if he’s bought himself. If he has, who was his attorney? How did he find his attorney? And was he happy with his attorney’s work?

In addition, invest in title insurance. It’s available now most places where you’d want to buy. It’s a safeguard that is well worth the cost (typically about 1% of the property purchase price). I recommend First American Title, www.firstam.com.

Kathleen Peddicord

Tags: Investing In Real Estate Overseas
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Kathleen Peddicord

Kathleen Peddicord

Kathleen Peddicord has covered the live, retire, and do business overseas beat for more than 30 years and is considered the world's foremost authority on these subjects. She has traveled to more than 75 countries, invested in real estate in 21, established businesses in 7, renovated historic properties in 6, and educated her children in 4.

Kathleen has moved children, staff, enterprises, household goods, and pets across three continents, from the East Coast of the United States to Waterford, Ireland... then to Paris, France... next to Panama City, where she has based her Live and Invest Overseas business. Most recently, Kathleen and her husband Lief Simon are dividing their time between Panama and Paris.

Kathleen was a partner with Agora Publishing’s International Living group for 23 years. In that capacity, she opened her first office overseas, in Waterford, Ireland, where she managed a staff of up to 30 employees for more than 10 years. Kathleen also opened, staffed, and operated International Living publishing and real estate marketing offices in Panama City, Panama; Granada, Nicaragua; Roatan, Honduras; San Miguel de Allende, Mexico; Quito, Ecuador; and Paris, France.

Kathleen moved on from her role with Agora in 2007 and launched her Live and Invest Overseas group in 2008. In the years since, she has built Live and Invest Overseas into a successful, recognized, and respected multi-million-dollar business that employs a staff of 35 in Panama City and dozens of writers and other resources around the world.

Kathleen has been quoted by The New York Times, Money magazine, MSNBC, Yahoo Finance, the AARP, and beyond. She has appeared often on radio and television (including Bloomberg and CNBC) and speaks regularly on topics to do with living, retiring, investing, and doing business around the world.

In addition to her own daily e-letter, the Overseas Opportunity Letter, with a circulation of more than 300,000 readers, Kathleen writes regularly for U.S. News & World Report and Forbes.

Her newest book, "How to Retire Overseas: Everything You Need to Know to Live Well (for Less) Abroad," published by Penguin Random House, is the culmination of decades of personal experience living and investing around the world.

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