Guanacaste, Costa Rica, 2024

Weird how the time has disappeared since November 29 when we left PA after Thanksgiving family meal, only to re-enter just 14 days before Christmas, with Christmas music in the taxis and the need to compress everything Christmas into a still generous but seemingly ‘rushed’ 2 weeks, including pivoting to the Christmas mentality. Who knows if there are even any trees left?

We took a tour through a crocodile infested estuary (tide-driven meet up of fresh and salt water) with thick mangroves on either side, with branches bent aggressively downward like straws to drink the brackish water, only to prosper, sprout leaves and then bend slowly up towards the sun like a regular branch.

In my reflective state, I contemplated the natural selection, the competition to survive - each branch of each tree.  Each leaf of each of branch.  Zero sum game of winners and losers.  And termites prepared to assault weak or dying or dead trees with gigantic nests the size of a football duffle bag.  Big crabs, termites, monkeys, birds, crocs.

We started like I often do - with a map, and me randomly pointing my finger at a point on the map, doing some cursory research, seeing who is available - in this case my wingman nephew, Eli, who I’ve introduced before, my son, Lucas Petersheim (full name for SEO purposes) and his good friend Cameron Jared Stark IV.

The randomness was offset with a lifelong travel experience that gives me a good instinct for destinations.  Tamarindo, in the Guanacaste (Pacific NW) region of the country below Nicaragua, is where my finger pointed, as a seemingly a good fit of beach town, surf town, and centrality of the coast that would allow us to day trip up and down.  The AirBnB looked great - but to honesty, there are actually a ton of great short term rental houses without a huge cost.  This good looking home served all four of us well, until Monday morning when construction commenced next door, which seemed like a real deal-breaker moment for me.  But since I had mentioned ‘zero construction noise’ in my very first query, the absentee Dutch woman owner quickly acquiesced to a full refund for days unused as my hunt for new accommodations was well under way.

Turns out, last minute rental shopping has a few advantages - 1, you have house owners who are flexible since they are facing an lost week of rental revenue and are happy to make a deal, 2, you get the benefit of people and families who had cancelled at the very last minute.

So, after 3 days of fun in the busy beach town of Tamarindo, and with my son and his friend Cameron set to head back to school navigating international flights and airports on their own, Eli and I moved rentals from busy beach town to Playa Grande, an isolated beach only a mile walk from Tamarindo via beach (with a 100’ estuary crossing), but by road more than 45 minutes as you had to drive around the estuary and make your way back to town.  You can walk to Tamarindo via the beach, and take a little $2 canoe across an innocent-looking 100’ clear water estuary, but that ends at 5:30pm since that’s when the crocodiles become more active.  It looks innocent enough, but unlike all the ‘no dog’ signs on the beach because of nearly-extinct nesting turtles, I didn’t see anyone ignoring the rusted ‘crocodile’ warning signs and navigating across by swimming or walking.

We lucked into a $1000 a night beach front house in a surf town with only 10 beach houses, and we got it for $300 a night since we wanted it that very night and it was available.  That’s a good tip to remember as my travel plans become more, not less, flexible.  I always knew that with sea cruises that seriously good deals could be had at the last minute but it seems to apply to lots of travel-related situations. I've definitely had it happen in reverse, where last minute did not pay well at all.

You think Costa Rica is just a hop skip and jump away from the States but it’s actually pretty far out there, almost Europe distance from NYC.  Southern Central America, west coast, wedged between Nicaragua to the north and Panama to the South.  On the Pacific side.  It’s out there.

Last time I ventured around the southwest, on the border of Panama, and for Costa Rica, that’s the less beaten path since its more bio-reserve than beach towns and zip lines.  I had a pickup truck and toured and zipped around on unpaved roads from Pavon Bay to Drakes Bay without much issue.

This time, however, maybe because I was in areas with higher density of population, the traffic and auto issues of the Guanacaste region, specifically in and out of Tamarindo, was unpredictable and horrific at times with 2 lanes busy with trucks, cars, pedestrians, motorbikes and what have you.  Partner that with no traffic lights or stop signs, lack of merging strategy, no law enforcement, and lots of traffic, you can really run into situations where an easy solution is hard to find, and taking an hour and a half to go 30 miles is par for the course and considered good speed.  Add an accident, or a slow construction vehicle, add some time.  A lot of time.  Perhaps hours, as one road and one road only is the only route in and out of these towns.

I didn’t have a lot of goals that revolved around driving around randomly, but even heading into town last night, we drove 35 minutes to the outskirts where we hit a standstill, based on an accident or breakdown or something - which forced us to turn around and go back home unfed.  3rd world countries with little to no infrastructure strategy and a burgeoning tourism trade is a combustible mix.  We left the car parked for the most part, which is always a victory for me since I spend 45,000 miles a year tooling around to job sites, and the like.

I typically like to pick up a book or two about a country when I go, but I couldn’t find anything of interest, fiction or non-fiction, about Costa Rica.  But now I’m interested in what combination of corruption and incompetence has kept the tourist trade tax receipts and construction permitting and real estate taxes unallocated towards stormwater and traffic infrastructure, as well as any sort of standard of living improvement among the population.  The 40 year vision to position Costa Rica as a preserve of extreme natural diversity seems to be a pretty big success with an abundance of natural wonders and tourism, but this prosperity has failed to filter through the country.

Playa Grande reminded me of Tulum in 2005 (with a few more new homes constructed in Costa Rica).  Actually advanced for what Tulum was back then but you get the idea - dirt roads, no cops, a few places to eat and bunch of travelers, not so much tourists.  The surf vibe is fun, with the best waves around, and a destination for the surf crowd.

One thing this part of Costa Rica is not is cheap.  The common meals, groceries, gas, lessons, beers and alcohol the same or more than USA.  The Tamarindo area, and possibly the Guanacaste region as a whole, for lack of a better phrase, is just expensive.  When I was down south in the country it was a different story altogether, so the idea of Costa Rica as a retirement destination is something I’d have to see exactly what areas they are talking about, and how the basic services are being obtained, because from my 10 days here, I didn’t see a lot of work arounds.

Back home we got a few homes under construction, and whippet quick, those homes are mostly being driven by contracts and pre-sales instead of spec driven.  That a little bit just came out of the blue, and in 60 days we put $2m under contract with another $3m on the horizon.  The cash flow and percentages of profits from being paid as we go as opposed to at the end of a finished project will leave me in a flexible situation for 2025 as new opportunities arise, possibly building out the $3.7m rental portfolio. We also have $3.9m of nearly finished homes that I will sell in 2025 with little to no construction activity left on them.

All in all, another rotation of taking cash out of the game that has been circulating and growing and at high risk for 23 years. Not taking it out of the game, not taking it off the table, but rotating into other assets be it residential rentals, land development, stock market, or cash.  I don’t know how to calculate starting with negarive $500,000 in 2003 and turning it dollar by dollar, year over year into 8 figures, but that’s my life’s work.  And at the same time, creating an environment of excellence that has resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars being stuffed into the pockets of employees, clients, municipalities, real estate companies, and a super long list of supporting cast vendors.