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[quote=”orcas0606″]David, why not ask the Tibetans about the good guys!! You are right there is no free lunch but what is the cost?[/quote]
You are absolutely correct that the Chinese record [i]vis a vis[/i] the Tibetans is awful on a level matched only, perhaps, by the Europeans’ record [i]vis a vis[/i] the native populations of the Western Hemisphere. It’s our attitudes toward such behavior that have evolved but not the behavior itself. But if we are to consider the two countries’ records, we should use the same yardstick.
I’m not arguing that the American record is all bad and that the Chinese record is all good. All I’m saying is that we Americans have been brought up to see the Chinese through an attitudinal filter that may not render an entirely objective view.
You’re certainly correct that Costa Rica cannot rely forever on the inflow of foreign capital. On the other hand, at the risk of becoming a client state, it does appear that China (an up and coming player on the world stage) is very interested in shoring up this little corner of the world.
Of course, nothin’s free. The Chinese, like the Americans, are looking for something in return. It will be interesting to see how that plays out. As Americans, with our genetic skepticism of anything communist, we are wary of the Chinese, but who knows? They may turn out to be the good guys after all.
In the meantime, safe investment returns here vastly exceed anything you could hope for in the U.S. and cash will continue to flow in to take advantage of them. Marcia and I are in that process even as I write this. Others, wiser than us, will, too.
Costa Rica entered upon a socialist path in the aftermath of the civil war and the subsequent new constitution in 1948. As compared to its Central American neighbors, it has actually done very well economically and socially. If wealth has been destroyed in the intervening sixty-five years, the society certainly has not.
Hmmm . . .
“. . . A major decline in three years or less” doesn’t sound like either “worthless” or “soon”.
The dollar has been very consistent against the colon (my primary concern) for a couple of years or longer. I’ll mark my calendar for January of 2016 and we’ll see if your doomsday scenario pays out.
[quote=”kwhite1″][quote=”VictoriaLST”]Kwhite has a good question. What is the colon tied to?[/quote]
I did a search and my computer did nada. Could not find any info it only exchange rates against the soon to be worthless USD.[/quote]
How soon will the U.S. dollar be worthless? A month? Two? You seem pretty sure about this, so give us a date and we’ll see if you’re right. I’ll put it on my calendar.
Hmmm . . .
Before you put terra cotta tiles over this roof with its 24″OC framing, I’d have a structural engineer take a very careful look at it. Tiles weigh a great deal which, especially if the asphalt shingles are not stripped off first, could easily exceed the structure’s loadbearing capacity. A tile roof is not something you’d want to be trying to crawl out from under after a serious earthquake.
Most of the “traditional tiles” you see here are actually stamped metal made to look like traditional terra cotta tiles, although some of those are used, too.
Typical 3-in-1 asphalt shingles are not commonly used in Costa Rica. They’re expensive, they require sturdier framing to support their weight, they require a solid wood underlayment, they are unfamiliar to most builders, and they’re not as durable as either terra cotta tiles or well maintained stamped metal roofing. Heat and sunlight degrade asphalt shingles and we have lots of both here.
They do muffle the noise of rain better than metal roofing, but that noise is easily overcome by roof insulstion which one would want anyway in either hot or cold areas.
In this environment, asphalt shingles would be low on my list of preferred roofing materials maybe just above thatch.
We have both dollar and colon accounts at Davivienda (formerly HDBC) and have had no problems with the status of those accounts. We regularly deposit a U.S. credit union check into our dollar account. They take ten business days to clear and there is no cost whatsoever.
Our experience may be due to the fact that we have a home mortgage with them and they want to be paid.
Our accounts there date from 2006. Your mileage may vary.
[quote=”sprite”] The day will come when this will be proved to everyone with a bank account, It has happened many, many times already throughout history.
[/quote]sprite, please cite (say) the most recent five of the “. . . many, many times throughout history.” that this has occurred. Nah! tell us ten.
Specific dates and places, please.
I’m certainly not knowledgeable about things monetary, but Paul Krugman of Princeton and the New York Times (a Nobel Prize winner in economics, by the way) has written that a significant obstacle to Greece’s economic recovery has to do with the fact that their government cannot devalue the currency they are tied to since they have adopted the Euro.
Were they using the drachma, they would have more control over their internal economic climate.
It seems that Costa Rica is or could be in the same boat.
Or maybe I’m wrong . . .
I think Bill is on the right track with this, Victoria. If the two houses exist on the same (single) titled property, then that property and all the improvements (the two houses, etc) are what are used to determine your luxury tax liability.
We have a main house and a guest house both of which are on the same registered plot of land. When I did the computation three years ago, I had to add the values of the two houses together.
On the other hand, if the property was split into two separate registered plots when you purchased it (or subsequently), and if each house was built on its own plot, then their values should be computed individually. It’s the same situation as the fact that our property and our next door neighbor’s are treated separately.
When you delve into this process, you’ll see that it is very thorough and painstaking. It even accounts for paved areas, grass areas, retaining walls, pools, and (maybe) the value of the landscaping.
In Grecia, at least, municipal taxes must be paid at the Municipalidad. The annual corporation tax must be paid at Banco de Costa Rica.
In my humble opinion, the best part of the Gold Museum is the fact that so very much pre-Columbian art has been preserved and made available for public enjoyment. The Museum itself is lovely, too.
All that said, we found ourselves thinking that once you’ve seen one or a few gold disks, you’ve pretty much seen them all. To the trained eye, the differences may be noteworthy, but to us it was an awful lot of the same thing. Still, if you’re in the neighborhood . . .
And if you are in the neighborhood, whatever you do, don’t miss a guided tour of the Teatro Nacional. THAT is the real treasure, in my humble opinion.
[quote=”Doug Ward”]
You’ll be so old by the time they get around to that chlorine won’t even exist any more.
[/quote]Actually, our water system has been chlorinated for two or three years now. So far, there’s not a fatality to show for it.
Thank you, Barbara Ann. We have a MagicJack too. And it works just fine.
The problem here is that the folks currently staying in our guest house need to communicate daily with her mother in Great Britain. She brought a new Samsung smart phone from Britain when she arrived but she cannot get the Skype app that she wants to load onto the phone, so she needs another means to talk to her elderly mother. The prepaid service I’m trying to locate meets this need.
With a MagicJack, I’ve had no need to explore Google phone or Skype.
