Buying a condo

Within the next 1-1.5 I am planning to go to a few select locations in hopes of buying a condo in the place I like and can get the best value. I have a couple Latin American cities on my radar already. I would also like to say that I am not a complete newb to travel. I have spent nearly 5 years abroad(Europe, South America, Mexico) since I turned 18 and I am 28 now. I am also currently learning spanish here in Mexico and would consider myself intermediate at the moment with 1 year left on this work contract so I should be pretty fluent. I am in a pretty decent financial situation and am willing to spend up to 100k on a condo. Though I would be much happier only spending 70-80.  I don't just want to keep loading money into the market or bank accounts. I want something real and I want to work on personal projects for a few years.

I have never given the DR serious thought until recently because I am more interested in a high rise building like they have in other beach towns in Latin America. But recently I have gained a little more interest in being close to home and I kinda like some of the complexes I found.

I've looked around online quite a bit but its hard to get a good feel without being there. The condos there look like cookie cutter apartment complexes from the USA and at first I was very turned off by this but some of them seem pretty nice. I notice a massive price range. I see some for under 40,000 and I'm sure there are some serious issues with these. Then I see others for 70k that look ok....up to 100k. TBH I can rarely tell the difference in the 70k 1bdrm vs the 100k ones. I also prefer something pretty much directly on the beach.

Here come the questions.....

When it comes to these complexes in places like Cabarete(just an example) or other similar towns... Who typically occupies them? do foreigners live in them? some locals? new tourists in and our every single week? Longer term tourists/travelers? What do they usually rent for?  Can anyone explain what life in them is like, generally speaking. I am interested in being somewhat close to a city so I can head off to buy things without paying tourist prices all the time. I actually want to live in the condo for part of the year or all so I need to avoid paying tourist prices on everything.

I do like to party a little but I don't think I want to live in a complex that is nothing but partying. Maybe somebody could recommend some good towns? I kinda like the northern coast as well as the smaller towns near Punta Cana but I'm sure it costs a lot more there.

Does anyone here live in these types of buildings? Whether on the beach o within a couple of miles?

I also want to add that I would certainly spend a fair amount of time before I choose to buy as well as hire a highly recommended lawyer though one of the services I subscribe to. I'm not looking to give my money away.