Spanish, kilometers, and lawyers...oh my...or, how we bought a car in Costa Rica.
One of the big reasons we shifted our "retirement" from France to Costa Rica was Project 22.156 which was passed into law in 2021. This series of laws was designed to make moving to Costa Rica more accessible to people from other countries.
The benefits of moving to the Central American country included lowering the minimal capital investment for Costa Rican residency from $200,000 to $150,000, money earned abroad would not be taxed by Costa Rica, and most relevant to this posting, people who qualify can import “up to two land, air or sea transportation vehicles, for personal or family use, free of all import, customs, and value-added taxes".
That last part is a huge deal for quite a few reasons:
In Costa Rica, the average age of an affordable, let's say $10,000 car, is 10-15 years.
The average mileage for the above-mentioned car is between 100,000 and 200,000 miles. Yeah, it's a huge range. Also, odometer fraud is common here.
Transporting your personal car to Costa Rica can run about $1800, BUT, and it's a big but, the import, customs, and VAT taxes can, and regularly do, equal nearly 100% of the value of the car. That breaks down like this; you import your paid-for $20,000 car, customs in CR values your car at $18,000 (they value it, not you, and it's generally higher than Kelley Bluebook), you pay $16,000 to get it out of customs.
The Costa Rican Congress approved the tax exemptions and Project 22.156 was signed, sealed, and delivered to the president's desk and he signed it into law that went into effect July14, 2021. Perfect, right? Nope. Just cause it's the law doesn't mean it's what's happening.
When we came to Playas Del Coco in April of 2022 our real estate agent warned us not to count on getting our vehicle here without paying the massive tax.
"Oh, sure," he said, "it's the law, but no one is enforcing it. The car dealers are never going to let that happen."
Meaning if you import your car they will hold it in customs until you pay all of the import duty and taxes, all of the ones they say are due. I don't speak fluent Spanish, neither does my husband (we're working on it). I don't have an attorney who is willing to fight that fight. (the attorney we do have threw her hands up at the mention of importing a vehicle and said a few choice words in Spanish).
Here's a recent article explaining some of the issues with cars in Costa Rica.
Ok, importing is out, buying a used vehicle already in Costa Rica is back in.
After over 30 years in the news business, my husband is an excellent researcher, it's his superpower, that and recognizing obscure TV and film actors and naming the other things they've been in, it's not as handy as the research thing but it's still impressive.
Applying his superpower my husband deduced that the first thing we needed was a good mechanic. Our real estate agent introduced us to his mechanic, Jorge, in typical Costa Rican fashion. He drove us to the shop and we met in person. (so many things are done in person here it's a shock to my American senses. Friends actually knock on our door here! Can you imagine? I'll write about that for sure).
Jorge stuck out his hand and said, "Hey, how y'all doing?"
Jorge, aka George, is from Mississipi. We liked him immediately.
The other thing everyone said was, to buy a car in San Jose. The cars here in Guanacaste are pretty beat up because of the roads (or lack thereof) and the registration process is stricter in San Jose so they are allegedly maintained better.
San Jose is 4 hours away, so in typical Don and Kiki fashion, we found a local vehicle, and went and drove it, thought it was good enough and had the owner take it to Jorge.
Jorge went over the 4x4 diesel SUV, called us and said, "Run, don't walk, away from this vehicle immediately." So we did.
Back to square one. Do we really need to rent a car, drive to San Jose, stay in a hotel and spend a few days schlepping from dealer to dealer hoping to find a good SUV?
"There's this guy a lot of people on FaceBook recommend," Don said the next morning over coffee, "He's a mechanic and he'll go drive a vehicle for you, check it out, make sure all the paperwork is up to snuff and bring it to you."
Me: "All the way from San Jose?"
Don: "Yep."
Me: "How much does that cost?"
Don: "Apparently a couple hundred bucks."
Me: "Totally worth it."
We called Ruben and for the next few days he texted us pictures of SUVs in our price range, about $10,000 US. After a bit of back and forth, we settled on a 2009 Kia Mohave. It's a big ol' 7-passenger, 4-wheel drive SUV, it doesn't get the greatest gas mileage but it has plenty of power to make it up the steep slopes around here and lots of room for bikes in the back. This vehicle made it to the top of the list because it had 139,000 km (about 86,000 miles) on the odometer, Ruben was familiar with the SUV because he helped the owners find it 3 years ago and he owned the same make and model himself.
I liked it because it was a tan/brown/dirt color and that was going to handle the dust and mud really well.
True to his 5-Star FaceBook reputation, Ruben brought the car to us. We drove it around the block a few times, up and down the steepest hills we could find and over some seriously bumpy back roads.
Don: "What do you think?"
Me: "Seems good. It sounds strong. Nothing fell off on the bumpy parts. It felt a bit odd in the turns but maybe I need to get used to a big SUV with a "luxury" ride. I'm good with it."
We transferred the cash to the sellers and Ruben handed us the keys.
Ruben: "OK, an attorney will come to you sometime soon and you will sign the papers for the car."
Me: "So do we wait to drive it until he gets here?"
Ruben: "No, you can drive it now."
Me: "What about insurance? Do we need to set something up?"
Ruben: "It's with the car. Just drive it as you would a friend's car."
We dropped Ruben off in town so he can take the bus back to San Jose and we drove back home with our new SUV. No paperwork in hand, no proof of ownership, just instructions to drive it like it belongs to a friend.
Me: "Did we just buy an SUV?"
Don: "I'm pretty sure."
A couple of weeks later, a lawyer from San Jose showed up with papers for us to sign (yes, you need lawyers on both sides of the transaction to purchase a used car here). He then left with all those papers after we took pictures of what he said were the important ones with our phones.
So, yes. I think we bought it...
PS: This is our experience buying a vehicle in Costa Rica but if you'd like more details and useful info from people who have been here longer and bought a few vehicles check out this blog https://www.twoweeksincostarica.com/buying-a-car-in-costa-rica/
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