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You can’t see the images unless you download the software from http://www.googleearth.com. Don’t even think about it unless you have a fast internet connection.
6 ways to get to Tibas (The huge Saprissa Stadium is there):
1. There’s a large roundabout circling one of the private universities (ULACIT) where the Carretera a Guapiles (highway to Limon) starts (right by BICSA). This is just north of downtown San Jose. Take the radial going west for 1 block and you’ll come to a T. Turn right. In 1 k or so you’ll be in the heart of Tibas.
2. Get on the Carretera a Guapiles and get off on either of the first two exits (turn left).
3. From the NE corner of the SJ Post Office (Correo), 100E, 2k North (they change the direction of the one-way streets frequently in downtown SJ, might be a bit different.)
4. As you pass in front of BICSA going West, you come to a stop light (Carretera a Guapiles). Go straight through for another 100 meters, turn right at the T. You hit Tibas in 1k.
5. If you’re on the Circumvalacion Norte (The beltline, for lack of a better word), there is no designated, official, or main exit for Tibas. But if you’re traveling West, about 0.5 k after you pass the bridge over the Carretera a Guapiles, turn right 100m before the next bridge, go 100m then turn left, go 100m and turn right. You should be on the main road to Tibas.
6. Stop and ask people along the way. It’s no secret.
Banco Anglo, a State-owned bank, failed in 1995 after a huge investment scandal. However, the CR government paid off its depositors 100%. They would not have done so if this were a private bank. Only State banks are insured this way. The ones that are left are Banco de Costa Rica, Banco Nacional and BICSA (Banco Internacional de Costa Rica S.A.)
Invest the $210,000. A 5% return will give you $10,500 annually which will more than pay for 3 day trips across the border 4 times a year. That way you don’t have to deal with the many rules regarding gaining residency “rentista” status, and you can live there on a tourist visa. You can still own a business, you don’t have to employ anyone, you can own property, and you can collect rents on that property.
Sure, you may not be able to conduct your “business” always following the letter of the law, and I’ve been chided by others in this forum for even suggesting that you can overstay your visa and simply pay a small fine upon exiting the country (though one said his CR attorney advised against it, in which case either I bow to his authority, or wink and nod since he’s just complying with his fiduciary responsibilities of telling you what the letter of the law is without acknowledging that it is widely ignored and rarely enforced – like US rules against being a dual citizen).
However, I would like to make the point that, as is clear to people who know the legal system in Costa Rica, – it’s broken. The constitution, as well as the volumes of national laws and the yet even more extensive collection of administrative rules, is a patchwork of arcane and contradictory verbiage. Show me a business that follows the letter of the law in CR and I’ll show you a bankrupt business. If businesses in the US skirt laws and regulations on a bet that their resulting profits will outweigh the possibility or extent of a fine, then businesses in CR do so in exponentially greater numbers.
This tangled legal and judiciary system, together with the nearly complete lack of enforcement powers of the State, is one of the things that make Costa Rica a “freer” country than the US. I say a Gringo that obsesses about doing everything absolutely “right” has no “business” there.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t talk to an attorney about these things, I’m just saying that you’re not in Kansas anymore. Take it with a grain of salt (and limon).
Come on a tourist visa and find out for yourself. No need to decide your fate today…there’s always mañana.
