A New Casa In 2017 - How Did We Get Here? Part 1

It is not possible to be brief about this.  How we got to this point is only something that could really be understood by someone who has been through it, sweat it out and felt it.  The journey is generally different now but some still live in the world I will describe.

Spring 2006 was our first visit to Sayulita and Ashley and I both looked at what this little pueblo was at the time and could become.  The town was really starting to be on the radar as a hip, surf destination though opinions differ when this actually began.  We saw what was happening and asked ourselves "Why couldn't we have a piece of this"?  It reminded me a lot of Park City in the early/mid 90's.  Cool town on the rise, easy to get to, great food, vibe and the environment!  An international real estate investment?  Really?  I did not even want to come down here originally to be honest.  Ok, let's look into it.

What we learned is that there are basically three classifications of property here for non-Mexican citizens on the coast.   No, I will not have all the details exactly correct so please forgive my dumbing down of the specifics and omitting official names.  This in NOT an real estate investment lesson after all(disclaimer).  The general classifications we dealt with were.  Ejido, Ejido titled and Titled land in a Bank Trust.

Listing photo from 2005

Ejido land is land without title that only a Mexican national can have in his or her name.  Wikipedia defines it as,

"an area of communal land used for agriculture, on which community members individually farm designated parcels and collectively maintain communal holdings."

This is where we started.  After a second visit to Sayulita, meeting the right people and looking at some properties we decided to "purchase" a property that was the cheapest ocean view in town.  Our investment in a house in Park City, Utah in 2004 had produced some equity and the rates to borrow on it were favorable so our first venture in to Mexican real estate began.

At this time, now 2006, most of the properties in town did not have "title" and were not even eligible to have one.  In other words, most of the properties in Sayulita had not been surveyed and documented in an official capacity and recorded.  Mostly the downtown area and a sprinkling of other properties actually had an official "title".  The rumor mill at that time was circulating that the agency that would do this was moving forward but where exactly and in what part of town this "titling" would begin was anybody's guess.

Listing photo from 2005 from top of property

So, most of the property in Sayulita was what was called "Ejido" land that was only available to Mexican nationals to "own" and it didn't even have a title associated with it.  (Actually, Ejido property cannot even really be owned since it is communal land but we won't get into that here.)   The question is how do you do such a transaction?  Well, you make an arrangement with a Mexican national to own/possess the property in your name.  This person is called a "Presta Nombre".  Since we could not have possession of Ejido property we needed a trusted person to act as the owner in name only and have an arrangement with that person.  What kind of arrangement?  This person would be the name on the documents and would need to allow us to do what we wanted to do with the land like build a home, sell it or grow corn if we wanted.

This is the core of the nightmare scenarios that you hear about investing in Mexico.  People investing in property in someone else's name only to have that trusted person take possession and sell it, occupy it and possibly leave the foreign investor with nothing.  Our choice for a "Presta Nombre" was the person already acting in that role for the previous "owner" of the lot plus she was employed by several friends.  She agreed, a fee structure per year for her services was set and we did a deal for the property with the owner.  At that time, 2006, prices were high and looked to be going higher so we bought at the height of the market.  We had our piece of Sayulita.

A New Casa In 2017 - Final Design

So what is this place going to look like?  Below are the plans and elevations.  As I do updates this will be a reference to follow as things get done.  The lot measures about 30 feet wide by 100 feet deep.  There will be three levels.  Bodega, Apartment and Family Living.  The bodega level(not shown) will be identical to the apartment level as far as footprint goes.  It just will not have living space.  We are only allowed three living levels so we do not want to waste one of them on a walkout basement.  I am just fine having a "man-cave" that we can lock things away in and shut the door.

The Family Living Level will have a master with two bedrooms sharing a bath, laundry/pantry, kitchen and living area.  The large X in the plan is actually an open to the sky interior courtyard that will help with air flow and light.  The living room ended up being shortened by a meter or so due to a HUGE tree that we did not want to remove or risk damaging.  The plan incorrectly shows a garden in front of the car which has since been removed to allow entry into the bodega level.

The lot is steeply sloped so the lower two levels actually hold up the top floor Living Level.  The computer rendering on the right isn't exactly what we expect to achieve but it's what the program kicked out.  Lots of things to figure out like keeping it secure.  Ashley's big desire was to have a very indoor/outdoor living style.  If we close it all up to lock it up then we lose that so we have to figure out a way to solve that.

Roosters - Neighborhood Sounds

Almost three years ago we move across town from the hill on the north end of town called Nanzal and began renting a place on the south end of town just off the Punta Mita Highway.  We gave up our ocean views and sunsets for next door neighbors, easier commutes to school and work and level walking distance into town.  The North end generally is full of nightly rentals, larger accommodations and less traffic.  The South end is generally more local.  The sites and sounds of life coming from local residents neighborhoods vs  the sounds of life coming from nightly resident neighborhoods is totally different.  One of the biggest differences is what animals you hear.

When you live where we do now you can generally get a good idea what time it is base on whether you can hear the local roosters.  If I get up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and do not hear any crowing yet then I know it is not 4:30 am just yet and have time to get a couple hours more sleep.  The crowing can be deafening sometimes.  I just attributed it to living in a more local neighborhood where so many roosters and chickens roamed free.  Over the last 6 months or so, several trees have been removed from the neighborhood that we see from our back yard.  I never was able to see any of these buildings before and then suddenly they were there.  One of them is a full fledged Rooster Condominium complex.  I always knew there were roosters and we see them everyday but I had no idea that most of the roosters that I had been hearing for so long actually had accommodations.  Am I surprised?  No, not really.  It just kind of confirms what I may have suspect all along but just couldn't see it.  Sounds like "Home".  The complex pictured is on some appreciating real estate.  I wonder how long the owner will keep it that way.  Times are changing.