Closing In On A Dream

In April of 2013, on one of our usual trips to Cancun, my husband decided to have a look at real estate in the area to get an idea of what was out there and the kind of prices we would be looking at when we decided to buy a place for our retirement.

He started online, simply googled "Cancun real estate". A ton of stuff popped up and he was pretty excited. He was positively overjoyed when he saw listings for some condos that were built about 10 years ago right across the street from our time share. All of the listings were in English and he noticed that one particular company had several of the listings so that is who he called.

The next thing I know, Hubby is telling me we are scheduled to look at 3 condos across the street! I was a bit surprised, but then again, not surprised that out of nowhere we were starting to look at real estate to purchase. DonLee is a former real estate agent himself and has a passion for it. He is easily bored. We were in Cancun for over a month in 2013. It really was the perfect storm. So the next day we walked across the street and met with a nice young man who spoke decent English and he showed us the units. We learned that his father owned the real estate company he worked for and that they had been selling in Cancun for many, many years. We learned that there is not an equivalent to the U.S.'s National Association of REALTORS so I immediately became more cautious about dealing with real estate agents in Mexico. Having said that, I liked the young man who showed us the units, and felt even more comfortable when I met his father, the owner of the real estate company.

So, we have always been familiar with Mexican policies regarding foreigners buying real estate. We knew that if the property was within a certain number of miles of coastline that outright ownership was not possible, it had to be done through a trust. We knew that real estate transactions are required to be closed by an attorney. We knew that getting financing in Mexico as Americans was next to impossible, and getting a loan in the states for Mexican real estate is impossible.