Real Estate Adventures

In our ministry journey, Pam and I have bought and sold several homes. But the recent sale of our home in Costa Rica was unlike any other. I’ve been told the sale was unusual even in Costa Rica. Apparently, some homes sell in this country in a similar manner as in the USA. But that was not our case…at all.

Now that the sale is complete, Pam and I can look back and smile. I hope you can smile along with us.

It all began when the buyer said he wanted to “look me in the eyes” before making an offer. He wanted to make sure I was someone he could do business with. Of all the homes we sold in the USA, I never even met the buyers. The real estate agents were always the go-betweens.

The buyer was a successful businessman from a Latin American country. He was looking to buy a home in a safe neighborhood in order to relocate his family. Our home fit the bill. Five US embassy families live in the subdivision and it is guarded 24/7 like Fort Knox.

So, the buyer and his family came by the house to “look me in the eyes.” We talked. We laughed. I showed him around. He and his family liked the house. So, right then and there we signed a sale/purchase agreement.

Part of the agreement included a down payment. Now, in the USA, it’s common to put down earnest money. Usually, this is a nominal amount. And, if I’m not mistaken, the earnest money is generally held by the escrow company. However, on Monday morning $50,000 had been deposited into my personal account.

“Well, this is different,” I thought to myself. But I’ll take it. It’s not every day I wake up to find $50,000 deposited into my bank account!

When we signed the sale/purchase agreement, I asked the buyer when we would transfer title to make the sale legal. He said, “Not until I give you all of the money for the purchase.”

That’s also different, I thought to myself.

Scroll forward three months. The agreement had 90 days to complete the sale. The closing date was approaching and we still had not heard from the buyer. So, our real estate broker convened a meeting with all parties to assess if the buyer was in a position to complete the purchase.

The buyer walks in with his real estate agent carrying a plastic bag with what looked like an egg carton inside. The bag was carrying $23,000 in cash. In the course of the conversation, the buyer asked me a couple of times if I would take the cash as part of the home purchase. He never explained where the cash came from. But we were all wondering the same thing, “Who walks around with a plastic bag carrying $23,000?”

Our broker wisely protected me by saying more than once that the transactions have to be through a bank. The buyer was not happy.

However, other than the bag of cash, the meeting went smoothly and the buyer assured us that we would close later that week. A date was set for the upcoming Saturday morning to sign the deed and transfer title.

On Friday, the rest of the purchase price was deposited into my personal bank account. Mind you, this was before the title documents were signed. We didn’t sign until the following day.

I’m an honest person, generally. But it crossed my mind that someone else could have skipped the country, kept the money and they would still own the house. Ouch!

However, this story ends well. We met at the realtor’s office on Saturday morning and signed the title transfer documents.

A few days later, Pam and I moved out and turned the keys over to the new owner.

We are now happily settled into our cozy apartment in an area of San Jose called Escazú.

“Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore!”