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I own property in Costa Rica. From what I understand, property records, taxes & ownership were a huge problem up until ~10 years ago when all the disparate pro
by leesalminen 4y ago
I own property in Costa Rica.
From what I understand, property records, taxes & ownership were a huge problem up until ~10 years ago when all the disparate property record systems were merged into a nationalized, computerized, property record system.
To pay my property taxes, I just log into my county's website and pay with a Visa card. It's very easy.
Our property record uses GPS coordinates and relative distances from those points to determine the boundaries of the property. It's common to have the surveyors with their fancy laser & GPS machines come out during due diligence in a real estate transaction.
It feels pretty similar to the rest of the world now, though it hasn't always been this way.
- hadlock 4y agoThanks for your ground-truth insight. Does your county offer a "plat" where you can view your property plat number, and adjoining parcels? Surely it includes a road if your property has road frontage? I'm not sure how other countries handle it but in the US at least, seems to be fairly standardized from state to state with all of this information written on it.
- leesalminen 4y agoYes, it does. They call them a "plano". You can examine this all online in the national property registry. Entering a property ID number will let you see the drawing of property lines, road frontages, concessions, etc. Can also see the ownership & transfer history, any liens, unpaid taxes, etc. The website also gives you links to the neighboring properties and you can view those as well. The website is only in Spanish and was built circa-2010 with circa-2005 UX, but it works, mostly.