Costa Rica legal blog
Real matters this office handled, anonymized and explained for non-lawyers, alongside briefings on the deadlines and filings that affect property owners in Guanacaste.
A Family Farm Dispute in Nicoya
On a small farm in Nicoya, a group of siblings — all of them now older adults — had spent their entire lives growing corn, plantains, and fruit trees, raising cattle, and living in the four houses they had built on that same land decades earlier. None of them held a...
40 Years on the Land, Finally on the Title
Five years ago, in Playas del Coco, a couple was living in the house they had built on family land. He is Costa Rican; she is American, married to him and settled in Guanacaste. The land had never, not for a single day, carried a registered title at the National...
Breach of Contract: Paid $25,000 for Nothing
In June 2021, a U.S. citizen signed a reciprocal purchase-option agreement with a seller in Guanacaste for a lot of roughly two thousand square meters, to be carved out of a larger property in Sardinal, Carrillo. The seller was acting as executor...
Contractor Fraud in Costa Rica
One of the phrases we hear most often from foreigners who have been defrauded in Costa Rica is: “why bother reporting it, nothing happens here.” That is exactly the belief that repeat offenders count on. This is the story of a case that proves otherwise. A...
Family Rights in Costa Rica Without Residency
Moving abroad with your whole family is, for many foreigners, the start of a new life. But when that life takes an unexpected turn, the question that causes the most anguish isn’t just “what do I do now,” but “what rights do I have here.”...
Well Water Rules for Guanacaste Real Estate
When people buy a property in Guanacaste with an existing well, they usually assume two things: that the well is legal and that it will remain available for private use. Unfortunately, neither assumption is always correct. This is the story of a client who discovered...
Boundary Dispute in Guanacaste
Welcome to Líos Legales, our series on Guanacaste’s most common property disputes — and how to win them before they start. Episode 01: the boundary line. Spoiler: the fence doesn’t rule, the registered survey does. When a French couple purchased a property...
Official Email for Costa Rican Companies
Every corporation (sociedad) in Costa Rica should have an official means of notification on record, and increasingly that means a registered email address. It sounds like a small administrative detail, but it has real legal consequences. What is the official email?...
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