Homes under 75k in PR

ozuye wrote:

Aloha,

I currently live in Honolulu and looking to buy a cheap vacation home in PR.  I have no real preference other than being outside the metro.  I've been to PR many times in the past and have years of island living experience, so all the negatives most forums point out aren't a big deal.  My only problem is most agents don't take me seriously since I'm so far away.  Clasificados on line has hundreds of homes and I don't really know where to begin.  I'd like to have several narrowed down before I fly out there.  Has anyone purchased a cheap home in PR on here?   Can you tell me about your experience?  Also, how available is solar power there?  Since the economy is in a so called "free fall" I figured now would be a great time to buy.  Oh, I'm looking for a 2-3bd and open to mostly anything as long as the HOA is low.

Mahalo,

OZ

I am not sure what you mean by "Clasificados on line has hundreds of homes and I don't really know where to begin"? --- Are you looking for suggestions as to what towns or areas are good, if so you need to tell us what you are looking for other than under 75K.

You also state "I'd like to have several narrowed down before I fly out there" -- If you mean that you want somebody to look at the houses for you, that is unlikely to happen. You need to make a trip and look at them with a Realtor or you need to contact owners directly and make an appointment to see the places yourself.

Solar power is available but not common. There are two basic ways you can get it, one is free and you pay them for the electricity it produces, the other is to buy the whole system plus installation. I do not know anyone in either type of plan so that is all I know about that.

I am in the process of purchasing a home but it is not a cheap one. One warning, once you locate a house, closing is likely to take 3 - 4 months, if you are in the island renting a place, it may go a little faster. Doing it via mail takes longer and still requires a couple of trips to the island.

By the way, one option to think about: is to buy a completely depilated home, demolish it and build your own place, it may come out close to the same price, it would be brand new, and it would have the style and features that you like. ** For some reason empty lots sometimes are more expensive than a lot with a house. One depilated house I saw was selling for 10K, but the other houses were too close and the lot was not large enough for my needs, so I passed on it.

I have no idea what HOA means. But if you mean Home Owner Association, that will depend on the "Urbanizacion" where the house is located and the facilities in that community reserved for the recidents. For 75K house, it may not be in a community that has Home Owner Association Fees. Condos do have it and they can be close to your monthly mortgage in some places.

Weird that you live in a tropical island and you want a vacation home in a different tropical island.

What I mean is that I have no way to gauge where the bad areas are?  The house may be nice but the area is not.  I put my price limit to 75k and hundreds of homes come up.  We like mostly all the areas of PR minus San Juan and Ponce.  I don't have time to oversee construction but being able to build my own place would be nice.  I don't plan to stay in Hawaii because the average home is 750k and won't be nice or you'll spend 3-4hours a day in traffic, the food sucks, if you run a/c your utility bills will be between $500-$900 per month, and countless other reasons.  I plan to move back to mainland and would like to have an affordable vacation home in PR hence the 75k budget.  I could go higher if I decide to turn it into a vacation rental but would rather not deal with that.  Will this type of budget get me nothing but ghetto homes?  I assumed there's a lot of foreclosures and short-sales going on right now with the economics on the island currently.  Home owners associations here in Hawaii charge anywhere form $300-$2000 per month which is why I'm wondering about them in PR.  I was just wondering if anyone else had purchased a cheap home and what experience they had.

ozuye wrote:

What I mean is that I have no way to gauge where the bad areas are?  The house may be nice but the area is not.  I put my price limit to 75k and hundreds of homes come up.  We like mostly all the areas of PR minus San Juan and Ponce.  I don't have time to oversee construction but being able to build my own place would be nice.  I don't plan to stay in Hawaii because the average home is 750k and won't be nice or you'll spend 3-4hours a day in traffic, the food sucks, if you run a/c your utility bills will be between $500-$900 per month, and countless other reasons.  I plan to move back to mainland and would like to have an affordable vacation home in PR hence the 75k budget.  I could go higher if I decide to turn it into a vacation rental but would rather not deal with that.  Will this type of budget get me nothing but ghetto homes?  I assumed there's a lot of foreclosures and short-sales going on right now with the economics on the island currently.  Home owners associations here in Hawaii charge anywhere form $300-$2000 per month which is why I'm wondering about them in PR.  I was just wondering if anyone else had purchased a cheap home and what experience they had.

Several of the people here are in different areas of the island, if you make friends with them they may advice you as to good places. The "country" side may be a consideration, what we call "El Campo", were very humble people live, plant and raise their children. these are very sparse communities of 100 or less homes that dot the country side of multiple areas of the island. But not sure what you like.
I am not yet in the island and it is going to be several months before I land there.

Regarles, some of those homes may be sold if you wait too long, so you are going to need several trips to the island to look at some of the potential homes. There are a lot of good communities in the island.

I will suggest taking a trip to the island and spend some time looking at areas were you may be interested. How good in your Spanish? Have you been to PR before (other than staying at a hotel in the metro area)? Do you want to be close to the beach?  Close to the metro area? Do you want to deal only with realtors? Are you willing to wait for a 2-4 month transaction? When we mention island time, we are not kidding...

As Rey mentioned, you may want to narrow down your wants/likes. Yes you can get a good deal since a lot of people are selling, but if you don't do your homework you may be regretting your decision later on and spending more money on the long run. I will suggest to read some of the post here and post your questions, we have a lot of good people in the forum willing to help....

With the massive population exodus, prices will probably continue to fall. Moody's just said that PR has defaulted and that more defaults are unavoidable. If you wait, prices will probably be much lower. (That said, I wouldn't buy property there as an investment under any circumstances for quite some time. But I'm not an investment professional so I know little of such things.)

I will not recommend buying an investment property at this time, not even as a rental. The only reason we decided to build is because we are planning on retire in the island and live in the house. Rental properties are not a good investment since rent prices are very low (300-500) in most of the island and it will be a long time before you see a ROI on the property. Also, with prices dropping it will be hard to sell it and make a profit out of it for some time to come......