by Ivo Henfling

A week or so ago, in another blog, I asked you to learn Spanish and told you how the Ticos will respect you if you make an effort to learn their language. Today, I’ll make it even more interesting for you. You can learn Tico Spanish and I can assure you that you won’t be able to do anything wrong with the locals anymore.

Learning the ways of your new home country will allow you to adapt so much faster and learning Tico can be part of it, if you wish so. I know quite a few foreigners who have learned without going native. Learning will make living in Costa Rica a lot easier.

Like every language, Tico Spanish has its own slang and my dear friend and client Alf Giebler has written a book about it, “A lo Tico”, which means the Tico Way.

by Ivo Henfling

Before I moved to Costa Rica there was so much to do and there was no time to take Spanish classes nor did I realize how important it was to lean at least the basics. As soon as I started to live in Costa Rica, I understood I had to learn to speak Spanish, I had made a major mistake by not learning anything. As most Dutch do, I spoke Dutch. Nobody in Costa Rica spoke any Dutch and they still don’t. Not a good language.  

I spoke pretty decent German, but again, no good. My English was pretty fluent but at the time almost nobody spoke any English at all in Costa Rica. I had never realized how difficult it was to speak in sign language and no matter how hard I tried, most locals did not understand anything of what I was trying to tell them.

English spoken people are usually not used to make an effort to learn another language and do not realize that doing so has a lot of benefits.

by Ivo Henfling

I was born again in February 1980, when I was 25 years old. It all started when I was coming down the steps of a KLM flight into Juan Santamaria International airport. I am not saying this because I suddenly turned religious. I had to start life in Costa Rica from scratch.

Even though we all think that at 25 we know it all, I had to learn everything again, just like when I was a baby. Let me tell you about it, so you can understand what will be waiting for you when you move to Costa Rica.

Just a couple of days after my arrival, I quickly found out that if I wanted my move to Costa Rica to be successful and to be happy in my new life, I had to learn a lot of things. In these 30 years, many customs have changed, just like small town grows into a city by development.

by Judy in Atenas

Two sisters - Judy and Roxi - are creating a whole new life in Costa Rica post-retirement from the United States. They were in touch with our Atenas real estate agent before they moved to Costa Rica and gave Isabelle Jones a raving testimonial. Hear about Judy and Roxi's adventures, travels and experiences via their blog. They are living their dream!

Are We Still Dreaming - Has Reality Set in?

"You've Got To Have a Dream, If You Want To Have a Dream Come True"

Dennis Waitley

by Ivo Henfling

I am not a political person but I want you to vote for Obama. Some might smile at this comment and some might hate me for it. That’s why I generally stay away from politics, religion and issues that should not be mixed in business in my blogs.

The reason for me writing this is really because Shell Johanson, our agent in Cariari, sent me the cartoon below. I have always thought it was just me that saw this happen, but it seems to be a general feeling. Those clients that have been with me in the past couple of months, as well as many North American voters that I meet every day will agree that I have been promoting Obama like crazy.

Don’t worry, I have not gone crazy (yet), this has a reason.

By Ivo Henfling

Imagine never having to clean your house again, or having to do the laundry and ironing shirts and pants. Cleaning the windows, do the yard and clean your pool. You’ll be able to finally sit down on your terrace with a good book, or just have a rum ‘n coke and enjoy the views. You got it right, you have just arrived to Costa Rica.

The cost of living in Costa Rica has gone up but hiring a maid, gardener or caretaker is still very affordable. Being able to afford a full time maid or housekeeper to take care of your home is one of the main attractions of living in Costa Rica. While in New York you might have to pay $75 a day for a housekeeper, in Costa Rica you can have a full time maid for under $15/day.

by Ivo Henfling

Many people who are thinking of moving to Costa Rica use the Costa Rica Forums to find information. There are some real nice Costa Rica forums where people try to help each other.

Others have active members who should have never moved to Costa Rica or should just be sent back to where they came from.

They do not deserve to live in a great country like Costa Rica because they are angry people, they are negative about everything and are not there to help others but to complain and be nasty. I guess because they haven’t figured out how to be a happy person or they’re just ignorant.

By Claude Dugas in Atenas

I was born in Quebec, Canada and I lived there for more than fifty years. I knew from a previous winter spent in Amazonia of Peru that living in a warmer environment could contain its charms. Indeed, I have been suffering from the winter cold ever since.

So by the end of January 1993, I decided to come to visit Costa Rica to look at the possibility of making it my place of living.

I drove through USA and Central America and had the chance to live many adventures that could be the set for some very long and interesting blogs by itself. I still could speak some Spanish that I had so easily learnt in Peru so many years before.

By Ivo Henfling

To a lot of people I know, Costa Rica is hell, they tell me all the time: Hell, its beautiful here - hell, the food is great here - hell, the women are beautiful here - hell, I’m having a great time, Costa Rica is paradise.

Young people and senior citizens alike come here on vacation and are sold to the country; they come back again and again until they take the big step: moving to Costa Rica. People from all over the world retire in Costa Rica, some love it here and some don't find that happy life they expect to find. But if you do all the right things, your chances to succeed are much better than if you start off with the wrong foot.

The wrong foot is where the disaster startes and 8 GoDutch Realty agents, all ex-pats who have made Costa Rica their paradise, are there to help you. To give you the Ultimate Costa Rica Real Estate Experience, for FREE, at no cost. Is Costa Rica paradise or hell? Find out in this blog how to make it paradise.

by Ivo Henfling

Because I grew up in Holland it comes easy to talk about the topic and quite a few gay people email me asking that question: “are gay people moving to Costa Rica”. The answer is yes.

When I was a kid, there was a gay kid on my block and at the time nobody would talk about it. He was the first person on national TV with his partner, talking about his experiences of coming out of the closet.

Jeez, I knew when I was 12 years old that he was gay. His mom and dad were very religious, poor guy, he suffered a lot and his mom and dad probably too. That was like in 1972.

By Ivo Henfling

This picture got your attention, didn't it? Well, that's what I needed because when I start talking about learning Spanish, most people don't pay attention.

Imagine, you get stopped in your home town by a Latin, asking in Spanish where the grocery store is located. What would you say?

Most would answer “why don’t you learn English”? Am I right or wrong?

The other day I saw a gringo in Escazu get mad at a Tico and shout at him in English. The poor sucker didn’t have a clue what the gringo was shouting at him. The Tico just turned around and walked away. This in turn made the gringo even madder. I enjoyed the scene from my car.

By Ivo Henfling

Many of us who have moved to Costa Rica come from cold places. Most of us did so because of the nice weather in Costa Rica, amongst the best in the world. If I look at my list of clients, I have people from New York, Portland, Kelowna and even less cold places like Berlin, Amsterdam and Los Angeles where it still gets to temperatures of around 30ºF or zero Celsius. I even have one client who still works in Kazakhstan and comes home to Atenas once in a while to get warm, he must be freezing his butt off right now. Most of us moved to Costa Rica to never be cold again.

By Ivo Henfling

There are lots of retirees in Costa Rica and some way or other, they all communicate with their children and grandchildren back home. If the Queen of England can use email to communicate her decisions to her subjects as you can see in the photo, you can too. The computer age has changed us all tremendously and every day we learn new things, even though we think we are incapable of doing so. 30 Years ago, my mom and dad were living in the Canary Islands, Spain and we would talk to each other about once a month. When we were talking, we didn’t know what to say to each other or we wanted to say too much at the same time. Writing a letter was something like, do I really need to do this every month? Then we got Skype and other VOIP and now we have Facebook. Further down this Costa Rica blog, I’d like to share a great video about Facebook that my mom shared with me today, by email.

By Ivo Henfling

As some of you know, I bought a condo in Jaco from a developer who did a good job in Escazu, Joshua ten Brink of Desarrollos Naturales. When the crisis hit, the bank thought that most of Joshua's buyers were not capable of closing, so they didn't give Joshua any more money to finish his project. Desarrollos Naturales and the bank are fighting each other, both forgetting that many people have all their savings tied up in this project and only thinking of their own interests. Joshua didn't want to tell me who all the other real estate buyers were, so I started my own private little war against him to try to get in touch with the rest of the people. I have done so online, just like I am writing this and many people have found me.

By Ivo Henfling

Some sellers of property in Costa Rica offer their property for sale “turnkey”. Read turn-key, not turkey. Turnkey means you will be buying the property with everything in it, except the sellers. Most sellers offer their property as such because they want to save themselves the hassle of shipping all that stuff back. Some times its nice stuff, sometimes its old stuff. Sometimes cars are included, animals and girlfriends….The word turnkey comes from "just turn the key" or "just bring your suitcases".

As a realtor, I generally prefer not to get involved in furniture being part of a real estate deal, unless you want to give it to me as a gift after closing. I’m not a used furniture sales person, nor am I a used car salesman, I'm a realtor (or try to be). Keep the furniture and the car out of the deal and you’ll make me a happy person. Over the years, I have been able to accumulate quite a nice inventory of flat screen TV’s, furniture and coffee makers. The other day I even got a tripod for my camera as a bonus.