Real Estate Market Update - The booming area of San Jose, Escazu and Santa Ana.

Scott Oliver - March 2009

It would appear that a few of our VIP Members believe that I play an important part in what they feel is the great Costa Rica real estate prices conspiracy theory...

Supposedly I am ignoring what's going on in the market, denying that the real estate market is in trouble and helping to prop up real estate prices by keeping the overall market sentiment positive.

Poppycock on all three counts!

Luxury Condo Apartments in San Jose

Supply and demand is at work in Costa Rica too and that's what we've been talking about all along. The overall demand for quality real estate by North American buyers in our specific area has certainly declined but, with credit harder to get than ever - for both buyers and developers - the supply of quality product has declined dramatically.

Just for you we contacted 14 of the largest construction projects in the San Jose, Escazu and Santa Ana areas to update our records. These are quality apartment projects that would appeal to the more sophisticated North American buyer rather than the developer of humble Tico homes.

Costa Rica Luxury Condos

The capital city of Costa Rica has enjoyed one of the highest construction growth rates in the entire country over the past ten years and we continue to see many companies (especially from the US) opening operations in this area to try and save costs.

We recently wrote about many of these companies in 'Some Jobs Lost in the USA Moving To Costa Rica' and 'Another Medical Device Company To Hire 500 Employees & Invest US$40 million in Costa Rica' and 'Bilingual Job Fair A Big Success.'

Now this information was accurate and up to date as of the end of last week so there may have been some transactions over the weekend but, unless you want to visit all of these projects yourself (and that's 'if' they'll even give you the information which is highly unlikely) you will not find better, more up to date data anywhere else.

What does this San Jose real estate data confirm? Out of the 14 largest projects in this area analyzed which range from 3 - 17 floors, where 1,625 units (1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 bedrooms) are being built or have recently been completed, only 219 apartments (13.48%) remain available and 77 of those are in one completed Escazu project that I personally feel is absurdly overpriced at $3,000M2 so if we removed those 77 we would only have 142 available....

How many of these 14 largest San Jose real estate developments
projects have lowered their sales prices in the last year?

Escazu Luxury Apartments

The full report which is only made available to our real estate investor clients details the size range of apartments, the location, the developer, the builder, the origin of capital invested in the project, the type of construction, number of floors, sizes available, how far advanced is the construction, delivery date, total number of units, internal distribution, price per square meter, price range of apartments, financing is available, amenities, deposit required, reserve amount required, website and number of units available.

VIP Members can download an abbreviated version of the San Jose, Escazu and Santa Ana Real Estate Market Update spreadsheet here. You'll need to change the size of the documents in order to read it properly.

San Jose Real Estate Market Analysis - 14 largest projects.

Written by Scott Oliver, author of How To Buy Costa Rica Real Estate Without Losing Your Camisa and Costa Rica's Guide To Making Money Offshore.