Episode 33: San Miguel de Allende Real Estate: Expert Insights from Top Realtor Greg Gunter

Scott Williams: Sweet Home Santa Barbara, where the skies are so blue. Sweet Home Santa Barbara, what’s worked for me, can work for you.

Jonathan Robinson: Welcome friends and family to Sweet Home Santa Barbara. I’m the co-host, Jonathan Robinson. I’m with my trusty co-host friend and realtor.

Scott: Scott Williams.

Jonathan: And, we have a special guest today talking about what it’s like to buy and own property in Mexico. Greg Gunter is a little bit of a bio. Before we start asking Greg questions, he’s quite an expert in the field. He’s a broker and owner of the first and flagship office in Mexico for Berkshire Hathaway Home Services. He’s the number 2 realtor nationwide for the country of Mexico among a 1200 realtor franchise. That’s rather impressive.

And, he’s Mexico’s only broker on the former Forbes Real Estate Council, that’s a little bit about him. He has focused a lot on San Miguel de Allende, name there. But welcome to Sweet Home Santa Barbara, Greg, glad to have you here.

Greg Gunter: Thanks so much, Jonathan and Scott. I appreciate being on board with you. I used to live in San Diego, so I’m a bit of a Californian myself. So, it’s
fine to say hi to Santa Barbara.

Jonathan: You know, I’m very curious. I have some friends that moved to San Miguel de Allende. Is that how you say it?

Greg: Allende, exactly, yep.

Jonathan: Okay, good, good. It’s very popular and other people are thinking of moving to Mexico. What’s the big draw to moving to Mexico, nowadays?

Greg: You know, your friends had a lot of good company. We’ve been named the number 1, small city in the world 5 times by Condé Nast Traveler, and 3 or 4 times by Travel and Leisure. I’ve kind of lost track so 8 or 9 times, we’ve been named the number 1 city in the world. I mean, not even Paris has had that, or think of your favorite destination, Bali or whatever the heck, you know we’ve been in number 1 so many times we’ve lost track.

Obviously, it’s the affordability. I don’t know if now a good time is to get into a quick little anecdote about that. I’ll get into it anyway, okay? Just for fun, to give your Santa Barbara listeners and viewers a good perspective.

I have clients that move down here from Santa Barbara about a year and a half ago. They had put in, now, this was back when the COVID craze was going on and people are having to overbid like crazy to get a property and they were bidding on a 3.4-million-dollar condo. They’re in Santa Barbara and their realtor said, “Oh, you got to come in at least 400 above if you even want to be in consideration.” and they said, “Okay, we will”. So, they did 3.8, but they ended up losing still on that bid because the buyers overbid by a million dollars on a 3.4-million-dollar condo.

So, that’s a 33% overbid on that condo and they said, “Maybe we should look someplace more affordable”. So, guess where that was? They came down to San Miguel de Allende. They bought a huge state right in the center of town. A very newly renovated, it’s got some historic walls to it. But, almost a newly renovated property. Beautiful, gorgeous views of the parochial. A 3-minute walk to our town square, which is called the Jardin, for 1.95 million. So, less than half of what they would have paid for a condo in Santa Barbara.

And, everything in this home is custom-made, nothing’s from a box, and everything is handcrafted. Even the wrought iron, the doors, the windows, everything is custom crafted. So, the craftsmanship of the homes that you get down here, you know, you buy a 4-million dollar home in Irvine all day long and they’re, you know, everything’s out of a box. There’s a cookie cutter, you have a hard time remembering, which home is switched. And here, every home is very unique, very different, and very affordable.

You’re carrying costs are extremely low. I’m probably answering a ton of questions and want to answer them. I’m sorry about that. But you know, that’s what draws people down here. The affordability of not only the real estate if you’re coming from the coast but also the affordability of the carrying costs. And then, I can get into factors like lifestyle.

We have the biggest English language, social and cultural infrastructure anywhere in Mexico. The English language is kind of important for us ex-pats, moving down from the states. I’m an American. I’ve lived down here full-time for 14 years and my Spanish is still not that good, and that’s the wonderful thing about living in this town. You can have the affordability, you can have the lifestyle. You can have the plethora of 500-plus restaurants that we have on TripAdvisor. All without being an expert in Spanish. I can cripple by with my high school-level Spanish and still do fine. It’s a very easy environment to live in.

Jonathan: You got a lot of people sold. I’m wondering, I’ve heard that it’s not that easy to buy property in Mexico because of certain laws. Can you go into what are some of the hassles people have to deal with?

Greg: I saw some of the feedback that you gave me and it’s a perfect example of why we’re doing this show because a lot of people have the misconception that you can’t buy a home in Mexico, that you can only do if what’s called a [inaudible] lease.

And, that is only true if you’re buying along the coast or the border. So, when you’re buying in central Mexico, where I am. You own the home fee simply, just like in the United States. So, you’ve got your name on the deed. You’ve got the title to it, it’s your home. It’s never going to get taken away. You’ll always have it. So, that makes the process a little easier, a little more comforting, for a lot of people to know that they physically own the property. It’s not some sort of bank trust. It’s a pretty easy process.

So, just to get into that just a little bit, Jonathan, we’re very much, at least in San Miguel de Allende, very much like the American style of doing real estate. The difference, I guess, would be that there’s a larger earnest money deposit, typically it’s 10% down here. So, that’s one of the bigger differences. You could buy a 4-million dollar house with a, sometimes a 5-thousand dollar deposit. It doesn’t take too much. So, that’s one of the differences.

But other than that, we use escrow, you know, we’re using a notario to close. And, that notario is the equivalent of a title company and a closing company rolled into 1 entity. Our closing periods are typically 30 days, we have buyers up in a seller’s wrap and it’s all very much like a US-style scenario with the exception that we don’t have 2 inches of disclosures that we have to sign at closing. I love that.

Jonathan: Greg, I’m figuring that everything down there is going to be written in Spanish. And translation, how’s that happen in contracts?

Greg: So, here’s the way that all of the big agencies work, especially my agency, everything is bilingual. So, all of the offers, all of the back and forth, the promesa de compraventa that we do, which is a more formal version of an offer contract. But, even my preliminary offer contract is a side-by-side English and Spanish. So, you can see exactly what you’re signing. It’s not a legal contract unless it is in Spanish, but of course, no one down here read Spanish that well.

So, that’s why we always do it as side by side 2 columns, Spanish-English contract. The only document that must be only in Spanish, is the final deed. So, when we finally get to closing that deed by Mexican law must only be in Spanish, and the notario is required by law to have a translator there, who reads the entire deed to you. If you have questions, you interrupt and ask questions and get them clarified at the time that they’re reading all that.

And, by then, you pretty much know the whole thing anyway. So, you’ve gone through all the process and the negotiating and everything in English. So, the deed is the only thing and of course, the deed is kind of like in the United States. I mean, who cares about metes and bounds or metes and bounds whether they’re in English or Spanish? So, there’s a lot of reference to a lot of Mexican law that doesn’t matter. When you’re saying Article 2 Section 5, it’s Articulo 2, I mean it’s basically the same thing so it’s a very easy process. You have a translator there that takes care of that final one, but up until that closing, everything’s bilingual.

Jonathan: I’m going to imagine that people have the sense of security in the United States that there’s a title company. Chicago Title, First American Title, [inaudible] title, all these big title companies that guarantee that you own this place. How does that work in Mexico?

Greg: If you want title insurance, you can get it down here. So, it is available down here and you can pay extra for it. The notario by law is required to ensure that he is transferring property to you. That is free and clear of all encumbrances and leans. So,you might say, well he’s just a notario, he’s just one guy, it’s not Chicago Title with a 10-billion dollar bond, you know, whatever. And that’s true, so that is an issue but it’s this guy’s life. His entire career is based on making sure that he does the transaction correctly for you.

And so, he’s got the best interest in making sure it’s correct. Now, again, for some people, that’s not enough and so they actually can buy title insurance if they want. Yeah, it’s available down here too.

Jonathan: You mentioned a person might get a couple of million dollars there. Let’s say I have a 1.5 million dollar inexpensive house in Santa Barbara and I’m looking to retire. What can you get for 800 thousand in that city? Are you still going to get a nice place?

Greg: Yes, you’re still getting it. So, our median home price in San Miguel de Allende is 345. So, we are a little bit of a luxury market, you guys probably know nationwide in the United States, what’s considered the luxury market is only 7 percent of the overall market. Here in San Miguel de Allende, it’s actually 16 percent of the overall market. But, that still means there are some great values that you can get down here if our median is 345, you can obviously get a very nice home for half a million.

An 800-thousand-dollar budget might even get you a plunge pool or Jacuzzi or something like that. It’s still going to keep get you within walking distance of the Town Square, which is what everybody wants. I’ll jump into that just a little bit, everybody’s looking for down here. What they love is the fact that we’re like a small European walking village.

Most of my clients love the concept. It’s like being in downtown Santa Barbara when you can walk to the El Paseo and do the restaurants and things like that. Except for here, it’s the whole town is that way. So, most people want to be within about a 15-minute walking distance of our iconic Eiffel Tower, which is called the parochial church and it anchors our Town Square here, which is called the Jardin.

So, you can still find something in that 800 range. For instance, it’s going to be within that 15-minute walking distance. It’s going to be quite an attractive 3-bedroom home, Spanish Colonial, still custom, those kinds of things. So, yeah, you can still find some, some great values, save that equity, live off that equity, and you can live off 30 grand a year, like a king down here, practically.

So, a lot of people do that, they’re selling their coastal properties and using a third to a half of that and coming down here to buy a home, all cash, and using the rest of it to live off for retirement.

Scott: Where could you ride a bike? As well as walk?

Greg: Well, I gotta tell you, Scott. There are a lot of cobblestones in this city, we’re a 400 and 80-year-old historic village and everything is cobblestones. So, you better have some pretty fat tires and big shocks on if you’re going to be riding a bike.

You can, yeah. You never go more than 5 miles an hour in this entire city. I mean, and you seldom drive anyway. So, there’s not a lot of traffic to worry about but those cobblestones are kind of tough on those bike riders.

Scott: Yeah, yeah, I got it, little things you got to know.

Greg: Exactly. Yeah, everybody gets Quattro Motors instead Scott, that’s one of those four-wheelers with ATDs. I have baker clients that used to be wall street bankers for 40 years and they come down here and they grow a ponytail and put her purple streak in their hair and get a Quattro Motors. And, puts around on that Quattro Motors and acts like they’re 18 again.

Jonathan: What are property taxes like for buyers and sellers?

Greg: Property taxes are very low down here. To give you a feel, a half-a-million-dollar property might run you 8 to 9 hundred bucks a year for your property taxes. And, my clients from the coast coming from California, go, “Oh wait. Is that per week or per month?” and I’m like, “No really that’s for the whole year”.

Jonathan: Well, you know, the real estate market, it varies obviously, from time to time. What’s the real estate market been like in the last few years during COVID What’s it look like? Your crystal ball and the next, the future? What’s it like them?

Greg: As I shared that story of my client that was trying to bid on a property during COVID. You guys are going nuts during COVID, just the opposite for us, at least in 2020, of course, no one wanted to get on an airplane and fly down to, you know, we’re a second, third, fourth fifth home market. Nobody wanted to get on an airplane to come down here and look at a home that they didn’t really need. So, we were really decimated in 2020.

But, the market came back to record strength in 2021. So, in 2021 and 2022, we really had a record year. The under-7-figure market down here started to slow in conjunction with you guys and about the last 4 months of last year. But, believe it or not, our 7-figure and above market and for you guys, I mean, I just joked about a 3.4 million dollar condo but, you know, 3.4 million buys you half the town here.

So, when I say the above 7-figure market that’s nothing for you guys but for us, historically pre-COVID, we were only selling about one 7-figure home a month for the entire city. Now, we’re selling about 3 a month. So, we’re about to triple the volume and that seems to remain, we still sell, and even though it’s a little bit of a slowdown in the under-7-figure market, our above-7-figure market is still very strong.

And, we’re seeing more than 3 million dollar sales, 4 million dollar sales. I just listed, here’s a record for you and you guys would sort of get a chuckle out of this because 7 million dollars is nothing for you guys in Santa Barbara but I just listed the most expensive home in the entire city of San Miguel de Allende for 6.995. It’s basically a 7 million dollar listing. It’s a starchitect listing by the Mexican architect, Ricardo Legarreta. So, it’s like buying a Frank Lloyd Wright house or Philip Johnson or something like that.

And, that’s a record. It was seven million dollars, that’s a record. A city has never seen a listing that expensive. So, we’re still strong in the luxury market and I think we will continue to be so. Probably one thing that has been a big bonus for us, from COVID, is that it made people realize the fragility of life and that, don’t wait till you’re 85 to buy a second home in a gorgeous place where it never snows, and you don’t have to worry about the cold weather.

And, that sort of thing where you get a facelift for a thousand bucks. And, things like that. I mean, people have realized that don’t wait so long, and that’s why we’re seeing still strong market activity in that above-7-figure market, I believe.

Jonathan: I’m wondering how big the town is and where people fly into. Is it easy to get in and out? Or what’s that like?

Greg: A little bit of a challenge from that perspective. We like to say that’s what makes us such an elite environment. We are 75 minutes equidistant from 2 airports that are on either side of us. So, most of your clients that are listening, most of your listeners would probably end up. There is some direct flight, there used to be a direct flight from LA. And, there actually used to be a direct flight from San Francisco. COVID kind of decimated a lot of those flights as you guys know. So, they will come back, I mean, eventually, we will have another direct flight from LAX or from San Francisco.

But, a lot of people tend to have to come through Dallas or Houston and then you’ve got to go to one of those 2 airports, and drive a 75-minute drive to get here. So, Leon and [inaudible] are those 2 airports that I’m talking about. If you wanted a direct flight, if you’re coming from, if you have any East Coast listeners, coming from JFK or really even coming obviously from LAX or San Francisco. You can fly directly into Mexico City and then take a shuttle. But, it’s about a four-hour shuttle to come up from Mexico City. That’s kind of the best way to get into town.

Jonathan: How big of a town is it? And, what percentage are Americans at this point?

Greg: So, our town proper is about 150,000 people, and we have about 23,000 foreigners that own homes here in town. When I say foreigners, the overwhelming bulk of those, of course, are Americans, but about 11% of our buyer market are also Canadians and about 4% are European.

So, of those 23,000, probably 18 or 19 thousand are going to be Americans, and the balance is going to be Canadians and Europeans. Yeah, well, that’s what we love about it. You think you’re going to walk 15 minutes to get into town or 10 minutes, and it’s going to turn into a 20-minute walk, as you can run it in 3 people that you know. [inaudible] bar is going to be the same way, walk down at Paseo and you’re going to run into 3 people you know.

Jonathan: Is there such a thing as a condominium existing there or they are all single-family homes?

Greg: Now, we do have a lot of condos. Most of those are out on the perimeter of the town, and they sell mostly to the Mexico City crowd that wants a weekend home. We’re only 2 and a half hours from Mexico City. So, we’re very popular with the Mexico City crowd. That’s an audience of 20 million people, so it’s one of the wonders of the third-largest city in the world. So, there are a lot of those upscale demographic folks that are looking for a weekend home.

They drive here in a car, of course. So, they don’t mind being out on the outskirts of town where you have to get into a car to drive into town to have dinner because they’ve already got a car anyway and they’re used to doing that. So, in all honesty, most of the condos, 98% of the condos here, are out on the outskirts of town and not very popular with Americans, at least not with those that want to walk.

If you have a budget under 350, then a condo out on the outskirts of town is a good option because they’re just like the states. They got the pool and the tennis and 24-hour security. And, it’s all the amenities that you could ask for and you can actually buy a 2 or 3-bedroom condo for 300 or even sometimes less. But, it’s not going to be within walking distance. So, it’s kind of a lifestyle trade-off.

Jonathan: Are there any issues with things, like, visas, or being able to stay there a certain number of months? What’s that like?

Greg: Historically, it’s been very easy to live on just a tourist visa because you get to get half a year every time you fly into the country, and most people that fly down here are demographics. Such that, they are traveling on a holiday or they’re going back to see family and estates anyway within those 180 days. So, I know people that have lived here for 30 years and never had a residency visa. The new Mexican president while he’s been in office for 4 years, so he’s not that new, but he’s doing everything he can to generate more income. So, unfortunately, we’ve found more and more of the immigration officers when you fly in and you’re supposed to get 120 days, they go, “Oh I’m only going to give you 30 days” or “Oh, I’m only going to give you 90 days”.

And so, what that ends up doing for a lot of people that live here is, then you end up spinning the 300 bucks or whatever costs to get a residency visa. It’s an easy process. You know, they talked up, you said you had Portugal [inaudible] and they have that golden visa process. I don’t know how their process works but I would venture to guess that ours is even easier here. There are 3 thresholds, one of which you must meet to get a residency visa here. One is an investment in real estate, which is as low as you can’t quote me because I don’t do that for a living, but it’s roughly like 250,000 dollars.

It’s a low threshold for an investment in real estate. The other 2 thresholds are income. So, one of them has to be an income threshold of something like 2,800 dollars a month, or what a lot of people do is they just transfer 2,800 dollars from, they’re checking to their savings, and go back and forth. And, the other threshold then is in a savings account. And, I think you have to have 200,000 or something like that in a savings account. So, one of those 3, if you meet those, you get a residency visa and you never have to worry about it.

Jonathan: Because that money actually has to be in Mexico, or can the money be in? No. Does it have to be Mexico?

Greg: No.

Jonathan: Just have to have it?

Greg: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it’s an easy process and in all honesty, even then, you don’t really need one until you get ready to sell it. When you get ready to sell a property, you need to have a residency visa in order to take advantage of your capital gains tax exemption.

Scott: Are there any hassles living in Mexico that don’t happen when you’re living in the states?

Greg: Well, have you ever heard of the maneana[?] attitude?

Jonathan: Yes.

Greg: You all live in California. So, at least, you know, the word maneana[?]. If you have some listeners in Kansas City, they may not know what that word means. I’m German, my last name is Gunther. I’m very, I’m very organized and I’m in business and I have to show up on time to get clients. And so, you can get a little challenge with, we have a contractor and he says, “Oh, I’ll be there maneana[?] to fix your water faucet. I forgot my wrench”, you’re like, “Wow, how could you didn’t show up at the wrench”. And when he says, “I’ll be there maneana[?] to fix it”, that might mean next week, and who knows?

So, you have to learn to acclimate a little bit to a little bit slower pace of life, I have to admit. Most of the people that lived here, I joked that I’m only one of 6 Gringos in the entire city that still works for a living because most of the Americans who have moved down here are retired ex-pats, so they don’t care. They don’t worry about that, it’s easy for them to acclimate to that tomorrow attitude because, you know, you’re retired. So, you don’t really have to worry about it.

I used to have clients ask, “Is there anything that you miss about living in Mexico that you wish that you had from the United States?” And my one answer was, “Oh, I’d give anything for Whole Foods. I wish we had Whole Foods”. We now have a Gourmet Market that’s unique to Mexico called City Market. And, all of my clients go, especially the ones that still live in the states, go, “Oh, you know, Whole Foods are not as good as it used to be since Amazon bought it”. This one is 5 times better than Whole Foods.

I mean, it’s got 3 restaurants inside the grocery store. It’s got a wine cellar for private wine tastings and it’s an amazing grocery shop. I don’t miss anything now, I’ve got that Gourmet Market, that’s a 7-minute drive away, and it’s phenomenal. And, for those people that want their big box, the shopping, the Costco, the Walmart, the Sam’s Club, that’s 45 minutes away in the big city of 2 and a half million people. So, you can get anything you want.

The largest mall in all of Latin America is there. It’s over 3 million square feet. It would be the third-largest mall in the United States. If it was up in the US, all that’s 45 minutes away, you guys drive that long sometimes to get to your grocery store. I mean, not in Santa Barbara, but, you know, your listeners down in LA or, Orange County sometimes, that’s what they drive to get to a grocery store. So, we really have that small-town atmosphere that we all love with 500 restaurants. That’s not quite a small-town atmosphere. But, we have that small-town walkability that we don’t have to look at the big boxes and the billboards. Those are 45 minutes away so they’re a nice distance away. We still maintain that European village field.

Jonathan: Let’s talk for a second about just some practicalities of buying and selling real estate. What kind of costs are involved on the buy side when you’re approaching a purchase there or on the way out? What do you encounter?

Greg: Yeah, let’s talk about the buy side a little bit because there’s a lot of people that like to come down and buy here. It is a little different. So, that’s another thing that’s different in Mexico. We have, it’s relatively new, it’s only been in existence for about 5 years and I’ve been doing this for 11 years. So, we all thought it was going to decimate the market when they put this into effect, it’s called an acquisition tax.

And, remember me telling you how low those property taxes are? Well, the way that they supplement those property taxes is with this acquisition tax. So, you pay 4% of the purchase price as an acquisition tax when you closed on your purchase here. The rest of your closing cost, in other words, the rest of what you would normally pay to a title company and to a closing company down here is going to equate to 1.1 of your purchase price.

So, when you purchase down here, your total closing costs are going to run about 5.1% of the purchase price. Some people think that’s a little steep, that is a little different than the United States but it’s easily counterbalanced by your extremely low property taxes.

Now, and then on the sell side, you ask for both sides. So, it’s got on the sell side, your costs are the typical commission. Our commissions down here run about 6%, you do have to pay, IVA, which is that value-added tax on that commission. So, you’re paying 16% on top of that 6 %. So, it comes out to be a total of 6.95% in total costs for the commission. Almost a percentage of that goes directly to the Mexican-American Government. The realtors never see it.

And then, you will pay a capital gains tax down here. So, those are the only 2 costs that you have and the capital gains tax down here. I always joke with my client, I say. “You know that book 50 Shades of Grey?” Everybody always thinks 50 Shades of Grey applies to kinky novel sex. I go say, “No, no, no, really apply to Mexican real estate law”. There are always ways to work around, or help or fix that capital gains tax.

So, I have a lot of legal ways or legal methods that we can work with, thankfully the law still allows us to be flexible and how we approach that capital gains and what we can do to work on that capital gains tax. And, it comes down to things like whether you have a residency visa that I just talked about. If you don’t have one, you’re paying like a tourist and that’s a lot more expensive. Well, it’s relatively easy to get a tourist, I mean, a residency visa. So, why wouldn’t you? If that’s going to save you 50 thousand and capital gains tax. Of course, you’re going to want to get one.

So, capital gains tax really is not enough. I mean, if you work with a good realtor like somebody, it might me or somebody on my team, you’re going to get those taxes down to [inaudible]. It’s going to be very low.

Jonathan: Is there any question that we should be asking you that we haven’t covered?

Greg: Well, I think we’ve covered most of it, you were talking about, how long I’ve lived in the country and what it’s like to live down here. I think part of why I’m done so well down here. I’m the number one guy in the city of San Miguel and you know Gino and his team thought I was good enough to give the first and flagship office down here. So, it comes from a lot of experience but that experience is because a lot of the American ex-pats moving down here.

I think working with someone like me because I’ve been through that same experience. I came down here and went through the same experience of buying a home. I actually built my first home down here. So, I built a home. I’ve also purchased a home, I purchased a vacant land to build on for investment properties. I’ve opened businesses and closed businesses down here. I have done every imaginable process down here, and so a lot of people like the idea of working with a gringo, an American that speaks English.

It has been through that same process and can walk them through all of that. Realtors in the United States have to be very broad-based. But, imagine, I mean, you know, you have to tell what’s the best school in the neighborhood and things like that. But, imagine if you’re an American ex-pat, moving to Mexico, my God, the list of questions that you have is endless and that’s where we come into play. Okay, here’s the best attorney to talk to you for doing a Mexican will, for instance, because you’re American will’s no good down here. You need to have a Mexican will down here.

I can provide you assistance with getting that residency visa. I can tell you the best neighborhoods, I’ve done reviews of 13 of our best neighborhoods of the 82 neighborhoods we have. So, you know the places that you really should be looking for a home, and that all comes from my experience of living here for 14 years. I’ve been a full-time resident since 2009. So, that’s helpful to work with someone that’s gone through that whole experience because it can seem daunting the process of
moving to a foreign country or even just buying a second home here, not necessarily even living here.

But, it’s very much like the kind of living where you want to have a property manager that’s going to take care of the property while you’re not here. And, of course, I set my class up with a couple of the best property managers in town. But, honestly, it can be even easier than living in the United States. You have that property manager that it’s very affordable and you don’t have to worry about anything even if you’re living long distance. And, it’s a very easy lifestyle down here with 14 years experience, I can kind of share all the ins and outs of that.

Jonathan: Do people sometimes rent out their property like Airbnb?

Greg: Yeah, it’s very easy that in the last year that I had numbers for that, honestly, it was a couple of years ago, 2018 was the last year that I saw tourism numbers. So, I have to admit work that’s pre-COVID obviously. We had 3.3 million visitors that visited this little town of 150,000 people. Our city wide occupancy rate, hotel occupancy rate, at that same year was running 77%. I heard from the tourism Bureau that last year it was 72 percent. So, we’re almost back up to pre-COVID levels and as you might guess that provides a lot of demand for the Airbnb, VRBO, short-term rental platforms.

So, a lot of my clients, they’ll say, “Well, you know, I just want to cover the carrying cost of my property”. Well, you can buy a half million dollar property too and here you’re carrying cost for the whole year, your property taxes, your staff, your made, your gardener, you know, everything. Your utilities, electricity is a bucket A, so you’re carrying cost for everything down here is next to nothing, a half million dollar property. It might cost you 25 hundred dollars a year for your caring cost.

Well, you can make that back in two weeks of rental or a month of rental. So, not only can you cure your Carbury, recurring cost. If you don’t live here full-time, you can actually make a decent ROI. In some cases, that a double-digit ROI.

Jonathan: Any last thoughts, Scott?

Scott: Well, it’s interesting to see how different real estate is in different places. So, I’m glad Jonathan we can bring Greg to talk about this on the podcast. I’m pretty satisfied, we’ve got a lot of good things for our listeners here.

Greg: The bottom line to take away for your listeners is that it’s really not that different, the couple of taxes that are different but it’s really not that owners of a process and you do own just like you do in the United States and we use the same kind of process with escrow. You don’t have to worry about somebody taking off your money. I mean, it’s just like it is in the United States from that perspective. So, that’s the good takeaway for your listeners is it’s a very safe and comfortable place to own property for a fifth of what it would cost in Santa Barbara.

Jonathan: How can people get a hold of you Greg?

Greg: So, it’s pretty easy. I mean everywhere on the internet. So, that’s the easiest part. But, my name is Greg Gunther. So, my email is pretty easy, it’s greg@gregorygunther.com. And, I have an international toll-free number, that’s even easier for you, Dallas through down here to Mexico, is 8778784141.

Jonathan: Great. And, how do people get hold of you, Scott?

Scott: It’s scottwilliams.com.

Greg: That’s a great email, Scott.

Scott: You too, Greg.

Jonathan: Very informative. My wife and I will probably be having a discussion about this at some point.

Greg: You gotta come down and visit.

Jonathan: I might just do that. I’ve heard really good things about that town and definitely piqued my interest.

Greg: We’d love to host you. We’ve had some great, some of the top 100 producers while Marcus and Christy out of the Beverly Hills office has been down here and they love it. They’re ready to buy a home down here, and we enjoyed hosting them, and we’ve had a couple of other. Berkshire, Hathaway people that have come down and spend a little time down here. So, we love to host you guys to come on down and visit.

Jonathan: Okay, well, thank you Greg, and thanks for being so informative. And, thanks to our listeners for being on Sweet Home Santa Barbara till next time.

Scott: Thank you for listening. Please subscribe to our podcast on your favorite app. If you know someone preparing to sell their home. Please tell them about the podcast, visit scottwilliams.com to contact me and download the 2 free e-booklets: Is my House Saleable Now and How not to Buy a Money Pit. Thank you for listening.