How Long Does It Take to Close in Costa Rica? 45 Days If Nothing Breaks

The fastest closing I've done in Costa Rica took 23 days. Cash buyer, titled land, a seller who answered his phone. The slowest took 14 months and involved a dead shareholder, an unregistered well, and a 1987 survey that didn't match the fence line. Both were real deals. Both eventually closed. Since moving here in 2014 I've bought twice and sold once, and I've sat through more closings than I can count. The honest average is 45 to 60 days. Plan for that.

How long does it take to close on a house in Costa Rica?

For a cash purchase of titled property, expect 30 to 60 days from accepted offer to signing. The typical breakdown looks like this:

• Offer, counteroffer, signed purchase agreement: 3 to 10 days
• Due diligence period: 15 to 30 days (most contracts specify 21 or 30)
• Escrow funding and compliance: 7 to 14 days, often running in parallel
• Closing at the notary: one afternoon

Financing through a local bank? Add three to six months. Concession property on the beach? Add three to six months. Property held inside a messy corporation? Add whatever the mess requires.

The 30-day closings agents love to promise do happen. But only when the title is clean, the money is already sitting in escrow, and both parties actually show up. That's maybe one deal in five.

What actually happens during the due diligence period?

Your attorney earns their fee here. First stop is the Registro Nacional, where every titled property has a folio real number. A title study pulls up liens, mortgages, annotations, and easements in about a day. It costs almost nothing. Skipping it costs everything.

Then the physical checks. The plano catastrado, the registered survey, gets compared against what's actually on the ground. You'd be surprised how often the fence sits 4 meters into the neighbor's lot. The municipality issues a uso de suelo confirming what you can build or operate there. In cantons without their own zoning plan, INVU regulations fill the gap, and getting a straight answer out of INVU takes patience.

Water is the sleeper issue. You need a carta de disponibilidad de agua from AyA or the local ASADA. In parts of Guanacaste, ASADAs have stopped issuing letters entirely because the aquifer is stressed. No water letter, no building permit. Some buyers learn this after wiring their deposit.

If the property sits inside a corporation, and most do, usually an S.A. or SRL, add corporate due diligence: annual corporation tax paid, shareholder registry filed with the Registro de Transparencia, no lawsuits parked against the entity.

A titled house in the Central Valley is the simple end of this spectrum. Something like this 2-bedroom house in Ulloa de Heredia at $162,689 can genuinely close in 30 to 40 days, because urban Heredia has municipal water, clear zoning, and titled land everywhere. Scroll through the homes for sale in Heredia and you'll notice most listings fit that profile.

Why do beach properties take longer to close?

Because a lot of them aren't titled. The first 200 meters from the high-tide line is the Zona Marítimo Terrestre. The first 50 meters is public and untouchable. The next 150 is concession land, leased from the municipality rather than owned. Transferring a concession requires municipal board approval and sometimes ICT sign-off. I've seen concession transfers take 8 months. I've seen one take two years.

Titled beach property exists and closes on normal timelines. But you verify title yourself, through your own attorney, instead of taking the listing agent's word. If you're browsing homes for sale in Guanacaste, ask about title status in your first conversation. Not your fifth.

And rural properties anywhere add friction. Servidumbre access roads, shared wells, possession rights instead of registered title. Each one is solvable. Each one adds weeks.

Why does moving the money take so long?

This is the part nobody budgets time for. Costa Rica takes anti-money-laundering rules seriously, and escrow companies here answer to SUGEF. Before your funds move, the escrow agent needs proof of where every dollar originated. Bank statements. Tax returns. The closing statement from the house you sold in Ohio. If the money passed through three accounts, they want the trail through all three.

Here's what nobody tells you: if you wire from a different account than the one you declared on your compliance forms, the review starts over. I watched a closing slip three weeks because the buyer sent funds from a joint account instead of the personal account on file. Same person. Same bank. Didn't matter.

Most transactions happen in US dollars, so you usually skip currency conversion entirely. If you do convert, the BCCR publishes a daily reference rate, which has hovered near ₡510 to the dollar this year, and banks like Banco Nacional take their spread on top of it. Budget a day or two for any colón leg of the transfer.

So start the escrow compliance paperwork the day your offer is accepted. Not during due diligence. Day one.

Does financing through a Costa Rican bank slow things down?

Enormously. Banco Nacional and BCR will lend to residents, and the process runs three to six months: income verification, an appraisal that gets scheduled and rescheduled, mandatory life insurance, and dollar rates that were sitting around 8 to 9% this year. Non-residents mostly can't get local mortgages at all.

So most foreign buyers pay cash, pull equity from a property back home, or take seller financing. Seller financing is common here, typically 30 to 50% down at 6 to 8% interest over one to three years. And it closes as fast as a cash deal, because no bank is in the room.

Can you speed up a Costa Rica closing?

Somewhat. Hire your attorney before you make an offer, not after acceptance. Open the escrow account and submit your compliance documents immediately. Ask the seller for the corporation's books and the latest plano catastrado up front. Put a hard due diligence deadline in the contract and enforce it, because open-ended timelines drift.

And rent during the process instead of house-hunting from a hotel at $150 a night. A modern apartment in San Pablo de Heredia rents for $1,000 a month, and there are new apartments in Escalante at $1,100 if you'd rather be in San José for bank appointments and notary visits. Two months of rent is cheaper than one rushed decision. I've rented through three separate purchases and never regretted it.

One thing you cannot speed up is registration. After you sign the escritura, the notario files it with the Registro Nacional the same day, and that anotación locks in your priority immediately. Full registration takes another two to eight weeks. You own the property from the moment you sign. The paperwork just catches up later.

Frequently asked questions

Can I close on a Costa Rica property without being in the country?

Yes. You grant a special power of attorney, a poder especial, signed at a Costa Rican consulate or apostilled in your home country, and someone signs at the notary on your behalf. Funds move through escrow no matter where you sit. Roughly a third of my buyers close remotely.

How much are closing costs and who pays them?

Budget 3.5 to 4.5% of the purchase price. That covers the 1.5% transfer tax, roughly 0.85% in registry stamps, 1 to 1.5% in notary and legal fees, and $500 to $1,000 for escrow. Buyers traditionally pay all of it, though 50/50 splits are negotiable and getting more common.

What is the single most common cause of delay?

Money compliance, not property paperwork. Incomplete source-of-funds documentation stalls more closings than title defects do. Second place goes to water availability letters in rural areas. Get both moving in week one and your 45-day closing has a real chance.