Buying property in Medellin

Is it good buying a property in Medellin Colombia

I'm 24 years old I'm thinking about a property in Colombia but I don't know the rents and cost
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Dear Junior,

Welcome to the Colombia forums of Expat.com ...

There is no information in your Expat.com profile to indicate you have any experience or possess the qualities necessary to profit from real estate investing or real estate ownership in your home country, let alone an historically volatile place such as Colombia.

Based on the little information you have presented, it appears you would simply be gambling.

Fifteen years ago, as a homeowner in Fairfield County, Connecticut, I invested in my first and only pure rental property in the U.S. -- a multi-family apartment building.

Despite having read many books on property investing, this investment only lasted a few years.  By the time I got out of it at a loss through a so-called short sale, I was afflicted with hundreds of thousands of dollars in mortgage debt, the apartments were 75 percent infested with bedbugs and I spent months in rehab to recover from abusing unprescribed sleeping pills at a dosage that had become necessary to enable me to sleep.

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Be cautious .. and realize that what you may be considering is no better than playing a high-stakes casino game in which the odds are against you.  The only inexperienced foreigners who should be investing in Colombia real estate .. are those with money to burn !

cccmedia
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Hello juniorrosas031598,

Please note that your post has been moved to create a new discussion.

Thank you

Djameel
Expat.com Team
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@juniorrosas031598

In case cccmedia's post about how investing in real estate even in the USA can turn out something less than optimum, in a country where there are so many protections and disclosures for both buyer and seller, has not given you second thoughts here are just some of the requirements for buying in Colombia:


Even if you speak fluent Spanish and know the culture intimately, as a foreigner it's still a roll of the dice where every throw is a potential catastrophic loss.  Now, this is not to say it cannot be done successfully - but you must, like Elmer Fudd hunting rabbits, proceed vewy, vewy carefully.  And you cannot expect even the simplest of deals to be as simple and above-board as it would be in the United States.
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@juniorrosas031598 I bought a house in many four years ago it is already doubled in value. The cost of homeownership is small compared to the US but the process of buying a home is very difficult so be prepared for a very difficult long process. But in my case it has been well worth it

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@zbodell Seriously doubt the property doubled in value, selling is much more difficult than buying and if the communist government takes over all property will become unsellable.

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@Laker4115 You are probably right - the Colombian peso value has almost halved in the last 4 years or so against the dollar.  So even if the price in pesos for a property doubled, you may still have about the same in USD.  And of course you do not realize any increased value, unless and until you sell - and then you'd have to buy another dwelling which would also be at today's inflated prices.

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Z Bodell wrote... "I bought a house in many four years ago" that he thinks doubled in value.

Is this house in Medellín?  Is "many" a typo, meaning the Paisa capital?  What part of what city is this house located in?

cccmedia
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Couple things to remember, first due to inflation what may seem as the value has double in few years it has not, before you have to give 2,000 pesos to a dollar now you have to give 4000 so you're basically in the same place where you started.

Second, there is plenty of housing for sale in Colombia but there is not that many buyers so when you put your house for sale it could take long time, even years to sell.

Finally, remember that if you're buying a house/apartment as an investment and you are going to rent it you have to be very careful, the laws in Colombia protects the renter not the owner, if your renter decides not to pay the rent he can stay there for years before you can get him out of your house.
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One other thing to remember that if you live in a condominium complex with a number of units, there may be some tenants for whatever the reason do not make their monthly maintenance payments and as a result everyone else ends up having to pay more.  I was in a building where we had to pay an extra fifty thousand pesos a month because one of the other tenants was paying nothing, this went on for four years before the situation got resolved.  I never got back the extra money I had to pay.
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Condominium complexities.

I have been living in a condo complex -- a/k/a 'conjunto habitacional' -- since 2013.

The community fee on my unit is $29.26 per month and has been since day one.

For a while, a lax administration had trouble collecting the monthly fees from dozens of the 90 condo units.  They posted the names of the deadbeats inside the elevators, but never charged extra fees to those of us who were keeping up with payments.

There are big advantages to living in a condo complex.  Security, with a 24/7 'vigilante' guarding the main entrance to the complex, is a big plus.  The monthly fee covers maintenance in common areas and security personnel salaries.  Someone is always there in case of an emergency;  I discovered my condo had been flooding while I was out shopping once during year one because a water heater had busted .. the security man on duty hurriedly showed me how to turn off the water at a spigot I didn't know about.

I wouldn't avoid a good condo opportunity on the off chance that someone might not pay timely and management might then charge an extra 50,000 COP ($12.50 US) per month for a while.

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Nevertheless, the number-one rule for arriving new Expats still applies:

Do not buy a home or other property in South America until you have lived in the target area for at least a year.

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Some folks have been posting on Expat forums that it's a tricky time to invest in property in Colombia since a socialist could be elected president this month (June 2022) and might have ideas about redistribution of wealth.  I agree, it's a good time to be cautious until the situation shakes out.

cccmedia
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