Let's say someone's a spoiled American suburbanite living in some cookie-cutter upper-middle-class 4+bedroom home in the 'burbs, paying a bazillion dollars in property taxes so that his kid only ends up in school with other upper middle class white and Asian kids whose parents can afford to live in his neighborhood. And now he's spent all of his money keeping up with the Jones' buying crap from Pottery Barn and Bed Bath and Beyond that nobody needs but his wife likes, and after 20 years of mediocrity, his kids are off to college and he wants to do something adventurous by retiring somewhere exotic where his American dollars go farther.
So this guy that you definitely don't want as your neighbor, because he wouldn't be down with living in a tent growing coffee and would probably piss you off daily with his entitlement, would probably want a 2 (or more) bedroom house or condo, in a location with completely reliable electricity and internet, with a bad-ass enough kitchen to do some awesome cooking, either enough space for a home gym or close enough to walk to a public gym, and within walking (or commuting) distance of whatever the Costa Rican Wal-Mart equivalent is, so he can buy whatever he can't find locally.
How much money is Joe Suburbanite going to spend buying a residence and getting set up? And what do his monthly expenses look like? And what things is he going to have to get used to and adjust about his lifestyle?
@archwinger- Ha, I love the honesty. Let's see if I can help you. Let's do the easy stuff first: the Wal-Mart equivalent is either a Pali (owned by Wal-Mart) or PriceMart (like Costco).
Beyond that, there are lots of opportunities for you. I'd venture to say that most people that you're describing end up in one of two places: the outer suburbs of San Jose (Heredia, Santa Ana, Escazu) or at one of the nicer beach towns.
I honestly have no idea how much a 2 or more bedroom house goes for in those parts, because they can vary so widely. If lots of ex-pats are in the area, prices get driven up quickly. That being said, I've seen many nice homes like the ones you describe that sell for between $200K and $300K in the town nearest to where I am. Not sure if that's cheap or expensive, based on where you're moving from.
As far as water and electricity goes, that also varies greatly. I'd say that in our small town, it is functional 95% of the time--with occasional water outages during the end of the dry season. My guess is that this would be less of an issue in the suburbs, but possibly more of an issue near the beaches.
For the Internet, the country's come a LONG way in the past five years, since the market became deregulated. It's just as good as North America, IMHO. It costs about $50 per month where we are. Most goods (namely, food) are about the same price as in the States, though if you go to farmer's markets you can get lots of coffee and fresh fruit for much less.
Beyond the costs of a house, the biggest purchase to worry about is a car. The country's taxes on them are astronomical.