I am staying in Panama City until the end of next week. As this is a place where quite a few digital nomads from the US are living (partly for tax reasons), I thought I'd ask if there happens to be any land investor here who I could buy coffee during that time.
@johannes, I have in-laws in Panama City that do invest in real estate, both in the city and in the provinces. I believe in a couple of instances at least one of the relatives has purchased vacant land parcels, held them for a few years, and then resold them, but nothing as focused and intentional with respect to land flipping as what Seth teaches.
I'll ask my wife if any of the relatives might be up for coffee. I think they might all be in hunker-down mode due to the pandemic, though.
I am very interested in anything that you might learn and be open to sharing about the practicality, or not, of adapting the short-term land flipping model to Panama. I've often thought that I would like to try this there, if possible, and I tried asking some of the relatives who live there whether Panama has any sort of publicly-accessible property ownership records (preferably online), but unfortunately I don't think they knew what I was talking about...which might have been my answer. :-)
There might be more to it than this, but this doesn't sound too promising...
"How to Check the Republic of Panama Real Estate Records" said:
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Sign a Promise to Purchase Contract before beginning any search of real estate records. In order to search the public records in Panama, you must present a reason and motivation before searching for any relevant title deeds that may impact the purchase of your property. Hire the services of a legal representative, as the search of real estate records cannot be performed by anyone. Your lawyer will present the Promise to Purchase Contract to the Public Registry of Panama, who will then search through the public records for any title deed that matches the property stipulated in the Promise to Purchase Contract.
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@dl7573 Thanks and sure, that would be nice. To clarify: I was not referring to land investing in Panama (I now realize that the title of the post might have been misleading :). I thought there may be some people living in Panama who invest in vacant land in the US. As Panama doesn't tax foreign earned income from what I understand, Panama seems to be an attractive place for entrepreneurs from the US (or other higher tax countries, for that matter) who run a location-independent business (such as the land flipping business can be). I have not done any research about land investing in Panama (or any other countries) so far. The biggest problem would be, as you mentioned, getting the data. I would assume that this part is easier in Anglo-saxon countries as they tend to be a bit more liberal with data privacy from my experience. Canada, Australia and New Zealand would probably be interesting. Luke Smith has just published a YouTube video about his first property in Canada. :) In the European Union, you would not get any data due to privacy laws for sure. As to Panama, you are probably familiar with coffee plantation investing (Seth has interviewed Keith Weinhold about that)...
@dl7573 Also, I have heard that Panamanian real estate often comes with title issues. I have heard the same thing also from other Latin American countries. Probably Panama is still ahead of many other countries in the region, though.
I own a few parcels of land in Boquete, Panama. Depending on whether things clear up in 2021, I might take a trip there (that’s a BIG maybe though, a lot of things need to align). In any event, doesn’t sound like we’ll be anywhere near the same place at the same time.
Thanks, @johannes, but no, that was on me. I totally get where you're coming from. More than once I've told my wife that I'd like to pick up and move to Panama, and I agree that location-independent income like land flipping would be perfect for that. It's been a while since I looked into it, but I know they used to offer some pretty nice incentives for "pensioners" who retire there, with some pretty loose definition of who qualifies as a pensioner including no min. age restriction, if I recall correctly.
And certainly not a bad place to stop off for a shorter stay, either, if doing the nomad thing.
@retipsterseth, so are those the coffee plantations? If so, how's that going? Have they started planting, etc.?
They do grow some awesome (and sometimes very expensive) coffee in Boquete.
@dl7573 that's right. I made a video about it a couple of years ago when I bought my first one.
I invest in these through AgroNosotros and at the moment, I don't believe they have any others you can buy - but they are working on a new farm syndication for a cacao plantation in Belize.
@retipsterseth I have heard many good things about Boquete. Land of eternal spring. You're right, it doesn't sound like we'll be there at the same time, though. But Boquete for sure is on my list of places to visit within the next 2 years.
@johannes A friend and former JV partner bought some beach front land near David that he planned to subdivide. He is a Broker and Appraiser with 30 years of experience. The guy he bought it from refused to leave after the deal closed. He got the guy evicted, then the guy moved back in a short while later. On the second, maybe third go round, the guy told him he did not even own the property because it was Zonas National - National Park land. He spent enough on lawyers that he ended up with a Panamanian lawyer wife. Have not spoken to him in a few years. Not sure how it all worked out. I prefer to stay closer to home.
@sean-markey Thanks for sharing this. Buying property abroad has its challenges for sure.