Thursday, January 21, 2010
Real Estate in Santa Ana Costa Rica
While still in many ways maintaining its traditional feel of a typical Costa Rican town, along with its predominantly Costa Rican population, small stores, bars, restaurants offering local and international cuisine and Sunday fresh fruit and vegetable markets, Santa Ana real estate has been recently experiencing unprecedented growth and valuation in the entire Central Valley. It has become the place of choice with upscale grocery stores, gourmet restaurants, banks, gas stations, medical and dental clinics, beauty salons, coffee houses, hotels, business centers, private schools, malls and small commercial centers springing up everywhere. Located on the outskirts of the capital city of San Jose.
The Quality Real Hotel Santa Ana and the new Indigo Hotel are located in the heart of the new business district of Lindora de Santa Ana near the Business Centers Forum I & II, and is within 15 minutes of the international airport. The Business Centers Forum I & II offer state of the art business facilities meeting international standards in technology, design and parking where comfort in the work environment is set as the number one priority. Santa Ana Office spaces start at 200 m², the complex is backed up by its own emergency power plant, its telephone central counts with over 4,000 lines and connectivity has been secured through fiber optic cables to deliver the services of ICE, RACSA, AMNET and CABLE TICA. Also, close to the historical center of town, you will find the luxury boutique Hotel Luisiana.
The Mall Multiplaza, the biggest mall in Costa Rica, as well as PriceSmart (Costco) and Office Depot, are about fifteen minutes away in the direction of Escazu. The mall is home to over 100 businesses, a large food court, modern movie theaters showing North American movies in English, banks and financial institutions, department stores, restaurants and over 1,000 parking spaces. In October 2009, Multiplaza Escazú unveiled its "quinta etapa" (fifth stage) with the expansion of its floor area to include 86 additional stores, a new department store and more than 1.000 new parking spaces. The main focus of the expansion is the introduction of the Simán department store that is from Salvador and a host of other "pioneer" stores making their debut in Costa Rica for the first time. Multiplaza Escazú first opened its doors in 1993 and grew to a total floor space of 41.000 square metres. With the latest addition the total floor space is 68.000 square metres and 2.600 parking spaces, 60% of which are covered parking. The major stores in Multiplaza Escazú are Cemaco, Palacio de Moda, Zara and Carrión. Automercado supermarket and Cinermark multi screen theatre attract customers to the mall.
CIMA hospital, a frequent choice of expatriates, and the Clinica Biblica, a Tulane University affiliate both offer medical care with mostly English speaking staff and accept most North American medical insurance plans. CIMA is about fifteen minutes from Santa Ana.
The San José - Escazu - Santa Ana - Ciudad Colon - Orotina - Caldera highway has been in the planning and construction stage for almost 30 years. It wasn't until two years ago that the Autopistas del Sol, a Spanish consortium, was given the concession to complete the $230 million project and charge tolls to recover its investment. There is a toll of aproximately $2.50. The highway was officially inaugurated in January 2010. Drive time to the nearest beaches will be cut from roughly 2 hours to about 1 hour. The completion of the new highway is estimated to substantially raise land values throughout the Santa Ana area.