"The hunt begins for the foreign retiree"-Headline, La Republica

In mid-February, at the national level, Costa Rica launched a high profile initiative. To the fanfare of articles in national papers, a special government edict, web articles and enthusiastic reverberations through the real estate blogosphere, a plan was unveiled to promote retirement communities for some of the 60 million baby boomers who are starting to sail off into their golden years. It was a classic example of rediscovering the obvious.

Better late than never, I chuckled, recalling a conversation with a prominent politician almost 6 years ago. I argued that the wave of retirees in Guanacaste was bringing in at least $2500/mo. per couple, generating plenty of employment and was worth pursuing as an option for this country given the approaching retirement of the baby boomers. "It would be very interesting to run some numbers on that," he commented. Well, somebody finally did and came up with the goal of 10,000 retirees per year, synchronizing with the current trend of medical tourism and building whole ‘clusters'-or retirement communities-in a number of zones that have been identified as desirable for a variety of reasons.

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The President of Costa Rica, Oscar Arias is expected to sign an Executive Decree which will make the attraction of foreign retirees to Costa Rica a National Priority.

By implementing this policy the government can then provide incentives to the baby boomers that want to retire in Costa Rica. The government will also be able to provide incentives and streamline the permitting process for companies that build retirement communities for the Baby Boomers.

In 1971 Costa Rica was at the forefront in legislation attracting foreign retirees. In that year Costa Rica passed the Pensionado-Rentista program which at the time was administered by the Costa Rican Tourism Board. The program was very successful and instrumental in attracting retirees and investors to Costa Rica for many years.

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