Caldera highway gets construction go ahead at last

By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Transport officials have given the much-awaited go ahead for the $230 million San José-Caldera highway.

This means that Autopistas del Sol S.A., the concession holder for the project, has 30 months to complete the highway. The 77-km (48-mile) highway will decrease dramatically the travel time from the Central Valley to the Pacific coast.

The first stage of the job is the reconstruction of the existing highway from Parque La Sabana to Ciudad Colón. Much of the highway already is multi-lane.

The big job is a 39-km (24-mile) section from Ciudad Colón to Orotina. That highway is only graded roughly now, although bridges are in place. The third and final step is improvements of the highway from the Orotina interchange to the Puerto de Caldera at Puntarenas.

Autopistas del Sol will have the right to collect tolls for 25 years to offset the investment.
The Ministerio de Obras Públicas y Transportes said that employees worked during the holidays to make sure all the requirements were in place for the start of construction.

Autopistas finally got all its financial commitments in order four days before Christmas, and a company official asked to be allowed to start work a week ago.

During the holidays transport ministry workers said they got final approvals from the Ministerio de Ambiente y Energía, reviewed and approved plans and did the paperwork so that the company would not have to pay taxes on imported equipment. Environmental approval was needed because Autopista will take gravel from several deposits along the route.

Ministry workers also had to coordinate with the Compañía Nacional de Fuerza y Luz, the Instituto Costarricense de Acueductos y Alcantarillados and the Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad for moving water and sewer lines, electric lines and telephone cables, they said.

Growing up in Hawaii, AOL co-founder Steve Case cringed as manicured cookie-cutter hotels took over the islands, wiping out precious natural spaces and crowding out local culture.

Now Case is proposing his own development in paradise: a us$800 million, 650-acre luxury resort in Costa Rica. But he says he is aiming to avoid what developers have done to Waikiki, pledging to make the new resort – which will be called Cacique – an environmentally friendly and culturally sensitive destination.

“This is like being able to press rewind and start fresh,” said Case, who is scheduled to announce the venture today at a news conference with Costa Rican President Oscar Arias.

The announcement also marks the launch of Revolution Places, the new destination resort unit of Revolution, a District holding-and-operating company founded by Case in 2005 with $500 million of his own money after leaving AOL. Other Revolution subsidiaries include Revolution Health, a consumer-oriented health-care company, and Revolution Living, a lifestyle business whose holdings include the Flexcar car-sharing service.

Case says Revolution Places will seek to redefine the luxury resort category by making environmental preservation and cultural authenticity priorities at every property it develops. Cacique, scheduled to open in 2010, is the firm’s first resort under that model.

Revolution Places says it plans to integrate the Cacique project with the terrain of the peninsula where it will be built. The resort’s 270 guest rooms and 300 private homes will be set among existing rain forest and wildlife. Rock walls will become walls of homes and the shade of the vegetation will replace man-made awnings.

“We want to keep the vegetation as natural as it’s always been there,” said Philippe Bourguignon, vice chairman of Revolution Places.

In addition to environmentally friendly architecture, the resort will buy power generated by renewable resources. There are also plans for recycling and solid-waste management programs, as well as on-site waste water treatment facilities. The company is in talks with conservation groups and plans to invest in several local initiatives.

However, any development within a complex ecosystem like a rain forest will always make a significant impact, said Daniel Williams, former co-chairman of the American Institute of Architects’ Committee on the Environment and author of “Sustainable Design: Ecology, Architecture and Planning.”

“If you’re going to tear something down and change the ecological value of it, you have to replace an equal amount of rain forest, which is virtually impossible,” he said. “The rain forest is a very sophisticated, long-lived system.”

Once a remote destination favored by backpackers and surfers, the northwest Pacific corner of Costa Rica has experienced a recent surge of development as the region has caught the interest of well-heeled U.S. consumers. Several luxury hotel and condominium projects — including one operated by Four Seasons — have been built in recent years, and more are being planned.

Ecotourism continues to gain popularity as consumers become more sensitive to the environmental impact of their spending decisions, said James Angel, associate professor of finance at the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University.

“For someone who made money in the high-tech boom, they may have some ecological guilt about a high-consumption lifestyle,” Angel said. “Spending time at a resort where they feel they are having minimal impact on land will make them feel better than going to some resort where the virgin wilderness is hacked away.”

Like Revolution’s other ventures, Revolution Places caters to a new generation of consumer. In the past, high-end vacations were equated with pristine hotels and fine dining, said Donn Davis, chief executive of Revolution Places. Today’s affluent tourists prefer swimming with dolphins and swinging down zip lines, he said. They want to eat authentic local food. And they want to take their kids, he said.

“It’s a whole new definition of luxury,” Davis said.

The project brings together several high-end travel brands. One & Only Resorts, a hotel firm with locations worldwide, will operate the beachfront hotel. Exclusive Resorts, a luxury time-share business owned by Revolution, will build 30 of the resort’s homes. Miraval, a destination spa featured on “Oprah” and owned by Revolution, will operate a facility with 120 rooms and 60 villas.

The resort will also have some star power. Andre Agassi and Steffi Graf, who signed a partnership agreement last fall with Exclusive Resorts, will design the tennis and fitness center. Tom Doak, a renowned golf course designer, will build an 18-hole course that limits the impact on the local terrain. Philippe Cousteau, grandson of the famous underwater explorer, will serve as Revolution Places’ special adviser on environmental issues and will develop activities.

To preserve the region’s culture, the company says, Cacique will feature local retailers, not Gucci or Prada, in the resort’s shopping center. Restaurants will serve regional cuisine prepared by local chefs.

The resort, 25 miles from the international airport in the town of Liberia, will be completed in phases. All services will be operating by 2010, but some houses will still be under construction. Residences will range from 4,000-square-foot homes to lofts of less than 2,000 square feet.

Though Revolution Places says it’s too early to set rates for Cacique, a look at One & Only Resorts’ other properties offers some clues. A deluxe villa in its Maldives location can run up to $2,180 a night.

“These will be some of the most expensive homes and hotels,” Davis said. “It’s for the affluent families who want the best of the best. We’re targeting the high-end, most discerning buyers and travelers.”

Revolution Places says it wants to get its Costa Rican resort right before exploring other properties. Case says he doesn’t want it to be too manufactured or theme-park-ish.

“It’ll be like the best of Hawaii without the parts us locals are not as proud of,” he said.

There is no doubt, Costa Rica is booming and its property market is already an unparalleled success story. With the slowdown in the United States, the burning question is, Will it continue?”. There are a great number of factors, including some about to come into play for the first time that will ensure that Costa Rica’s property market success will continue in 2007.

Taking into account that Costa Rica has had an exciting property market for the past decade it is still considered to be an emerging market because of the record gains that are still achievable and also because its real estate market success has not yet been duplicated across the entire country. While it remains an emerging market and yet one stable, secure and with so many factors ensuring its appeal, high gains will be made on properties bought and also on land banked in 2007.

Need more

Costa Rica is an excellent nation to explore for maximum profitability in 2007 consider the following factors:

The IMF has praised the Costa Rican government for doing all it can to facilitate the drafting of a free trade agreement with America, and, also for reining in spending to make the economy stronger and the nation therefore more attractive for foreign direct investment.

Thanks to the government’s commitment FDI is now stronger than ever in Costa Rica, the economy in 2006 grew far stronger than was anticipated and going in to 2007 Costa Rica is in an incredibly strong political and economic position.

“Anyone sitting back and mulling over their options should know that hundreds are going before them and backing Costa Rica as a property investment hotspot in 2007 and beyond. We could be wrong but we don’t think we will be!” source – Amberlamb Overseas Property Investment Resource

Firstly US chipmaker Intel have announced that they are to plough substantial investment into their Costa Rica plant and increase the numbers of jobs available to the local labor force, secondly a major UK based tour operator are launching direct flights to Costa Rica from London, and thirdly the Costa Rican government have extensively relaxed their immigration policies for investors bringing funds or skills to their country.

As Costa Rica is already one of our preferred emerging markets to watch, all this good news has got us excited! And property investors who were wondering whether the time is right to commit to Costa Rica may well be positively influenced by the abundance of positive news coming from this Central American country today.

First up, Intel has announced that they will commit one hundred and twenty million US dollars to improve and expand their Costa Rica processing plant. The direct investment will help create five hundred new jobs which will directly assist the local economy and help boost the appeal of commercial property in Costa Rica.

This news coupled with the fact that the Costa Rican government has just announced a significant easing on immigration restrictions for investors, employers and key employees means that the country just became an even more attractive prospect for companies looking for a more tax efficient, lower cost location for their operations. This will likely have a direct effect on the demand for commercial property, it may well boost demand for residential property in the main Costa Rican towns and it will undoubtedly raise the profile of Costa Rica globally.

IT giants Hewlett-Packard are another company expanding operations in Costa Rica in 2006; they are to double their locally sourced workforce by 500 and to begin a massive expansion of business interests in Costa Rica. Both HP and Intel will benefit from the fact that the immigration procedures their expatriate management will have to go through have been simplified by the government. According to the Costa Rican Minister of Foreign Trade Manuel Gonzalz Sanz, the new policies will help make foreign direct investment into Costa Rica more attractive and therefore boost the amount of investment the country receives annually.

This fact alone could result in an intensification of investor interest in the property market in Costa Rica…but the additional news out from the UK this week that First Choice are to begin direct flights from London in 2007 to Costa Rica means that hungry British property investors are probably about to descend on Costa Rica in their droves! There is much promotion of this stunningly beautiful and ecologically diverse country in the British press as a result of the First Choice announcement, and those who were unaware of the property investment potential in Costa Rica are now rapidly making themselves aware! Direct flights will begin from London’s Gatwick airport from May 2007 and already the flights and holidays from First Choice have gone on sale.

So, in terms of Costa Rica investment property news there is much to be positive about – but as always, we recommend that any real estate investor considering making a commitment spends time doing their due diligence on the potential profitability of a given property type before buying.

Puntarena’s old cannery will be transformed into a modern mall with a movie theater and office center.

What really has people excited in the $78 million Puerto Azul development. When finished it will boast 176 condominiums including 16 penthouses in four buildings. A 60 room hotel with 44 shops, a marina and supermarket will also be part of the development.

A second marina will be built nearby at a cost of $22 million.

The Ministry of Public Works is honoring its commitment by taking steps to finish the last section of the costal highway between Quepos and Dominical. The government has already built three bridges and is working on more and road has been graded between Quepos and the Savegre River.

A major international real estate investment and development firm says it is involved in what will be a $1 billion project in Papagayo.

Representatives of the company, Starwood Development, paid a call Wednesday on President Oscar Arias Sánchez. The firm, a division of the Greenwich, Connecticut,-based Starwood Capital Group in involved with the Monte del Barco project.

The project has about 500 acres of which just 40 are in a maritime zone concession. The project envisions 700 residences, two hotels, an 18-hole golf course and a beach condo-hotel and marina

Starwood Capital Group says it is a privately held investment management firm that specializes in real estate-related investments on behalf of select private and institutional investment partners. Founded in 1991, Starwood has a diversified portfolio totaling more than $9 billion in real estates, the firm said.