Ocean front property Merida Mexico - Yucatan mexico real estate

Ocean front property Merida Mexico Is it common for foreigners to deal directly with the Mexican owners and what is a lipstick house?

A lipstick house is a disintegrating ruin which has been purchased for maybe $18,000 usd, renovated cosmetically and then being re-sold at ten times the price.

There are lots of them, especially on the beach. Imagine a car that is a lemon at 10 times the price.

It is not long before you have problems with the mechanical plant, plumbing, septic deficiencies, walls shifting, the roof leeks like sieve and 25 other headaches. Fortunately for my clients, I know where those properties are and the players involved.

There are many times when the player doing the lipstick job does not pay his workers what they feel they are owed, and it has been know that the workers retaliate by putting nail holes in the pipes, resulting in the walls filling with water during the first rain storm or sabotaging the electrical system.

You cannot tell by looking at the house if it is a lipstick job or not.

As for dealing directly with Mexican owners, yes, it is common for foreigners to buy directly from sellers.

There are 2 types of purchasers who buy directly from the sellers. The first type being suicide buyers. Theses are people who buy the property site unseen over the internet and wire the deposit money to the seller.

Believe me there are people who do that!!!

The second type is the internet researched, who hit the ground running, find a local translator / driver, put in an offer and rock and roll. They have usually contacted half a dozen realtors in that market to get as much free consulting as they can get.

They don't want to pay fees because they see them as an additional cost. They discount the reality that they could easily loose 3 times the amount of the commission if not everything.

I routinely negotiate a final selling price which is 5 to 8 percent lower than market value, simply because I negotiate everyday, in comparison to a non-industry person who has bought and sold 4 houses over a lifetime.

The real value in dealing with YMB Realty is our ability to navigate the process with the client unscathed. That requires years of experience and a network of support professionals in that specific market place.

Remember, it is the foreigners you have to watch out for not the Mexicans. There is an industry of sharks waiting for you down here. They have a network of waiters, bartenders, local translators and a host of others, whose job it is to bring them in constant contact with the visiting public.

They receive kick backs from the sellers for referrals and are on red alert for foreigners who are on a mission to buy property down here.

Every village and town has a local watering hole where the expatriates congregate. That is usually where the sellers pick them up.

Here is what normally happens. A foreigner comes down here, finds a local translator and buys a property directly from the owner.

Later he realizes that buying the property was a mistake.

Now he wants out of the property incurring the least loss possible and looks for another foreigner to get him out of his problem.

He of coarse has the advantage over you because he has been where you are. He has learned a little bit about the community and the buzz words, and will tell his purchaser what he thinks the purchaser wants to hear. In all fairness there are foreign buyers who do come down here and successfully buy excellent properties. But the reality is, the odds are heavily stacked against the deal working out in your favor when you deal directly with the owner.

When you buy a property through YMB we guarantee you get the property you wanted at the price you agreed to pay, with a clear title and free of liens.

If it does not double in value in the next 4 years we will sell it commission free.

Robert Harker is a Canadian living and practicing real estate in Yucatan Mexico serving the beach communities north of the city of Merida, in the state of Yucatan. He has been a practicing real estate and mortgage broker in Mexico for the last 10 years and has a total of 25 years international real estate experience with 1,000 career deals and counting. He specializes in retirement beach property for foreigners and has a full service construction company catering to the needs of his market niche.

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