I sometimes tell people that the thing I'm most expert in is
photography. That's not to say I'm a grandmaster, but in a
comparison to my knowledge of other topics, I probably know the most
about taking photos. The process of buying land in Guatemala has
been such an education that it may now be my number two. I feel that
because I've done it once, and had to learn everything it took to get
it done fairly easily after finding the right spot, I would be well
to do it a few more times as investment if I didn't want to focus on
improving my first place, which is well big enough. At this point, I
want to stop and touch wood. After finally finding the combination
of the right fixer, piece of land, seller and price, the process has
been eerily smooth, through to the point of having my building permit
in hand and my taxes paid for the year 2014(only six days after the
land deal went through). Water and power remain to be connected;
both should be smooth and easy as well.
I've never actively looked for land in the US or any other place, so I can't compare it. Here, it's quite tiring. It's generally hot and sunny, especially in the morning. I joke that you can get two things done per day here. One in the morning, and one in the afternoon, give or take. If you blow one of those looking at land, you've blown one maybe taking a boat, maybe a tuk-tuk, but probably walking uphill and scrambling around steep, rocky, unkempt squares of the mountain. Unkempt isn't a reason to write off land so you have to give due diligence around through the brush as tall as you to try to quickly imagine where a house might go and the degree of impossibilty of constructing in that location. The person escorting you has strong odds of being sheisty and their company can be a drag or can be tolerable.
Here's how it works commonly, not exclusively. An owner puts it out there in the aether that heshe would sell a certain piece of land if someone was buying. Anyone interested (in quickly becoming a real estate agent) could come by this information easily. You can show the land to all the gringoes you want and if you bring an eventual buyer into the owner, you get paid. For this reason, multiple people may show you the same spot, a great waste of time and kick to the day's enthusiasm. What did Yogi say? You always find something in the last place you look. Most of the properties you're shown are a bust and dealbroken quickly for one reason or another(e.g., no water, too far, too loud, too steep). At that point, you figure out how to most quickly have the scout take you over to the next place and address a new set of measurements and asking price.
In my assessment below, I could see many gringoes disagreeing with me on a couple things. I was willing to sacrifice lake proximity and view for other advantages and securities. After you've chosen a village, here's what you need to ask for about the piece of land:
How big should it be?
Guatemala deals in cuerdas, which is pretty Guatemala because a cuerda can be anything from a bathroom tile to Lake Huron. I'm joking. A saving grace is that, I think, Guatemala uses the smallest version of a cuerda, 25m x 25m. I was looking for three to six cuerdas. Bigger would've been fine, but price was likely to prohibit. I ended up with six cuerdas, about an acre, which I'm thrilled about. The place is plenty large and spread out, and I hope it always feels that way with way less coffee and a few simple structures. It should be plenty of space for casitas, kitchen, chickens, garden and yoga. What's tricky about this aspect of the search is that a lot of gringoes end up buying up and combining several different properties into one, so that option is always there if you have interest and someone to help do the owner research. There is land open around El Jocotel, but that'll have to be later and hotel owners keep telling me 'don't let it get too big'.
What's the slope like?
People build on almost any kind of slope. Examples are close around. They know exactly how to excavate, refill, and build retaining walls and flat surfaces. It's still a lot of work and it leads to a very vertical life. If you succeed in finding flatter land, you've probably sacrificed your perfectly splendid lake view, and this is what I did. My land resembles the top of the cross section of an airfoil. The upper limit is nice and gentle, sloped, but softly not requiring much excavation to flatten out. This will unearth rocks all of which whill be used in building. I'll put the structures nearer the top, where it's flatter with better view. Garden and trees below. Good spot for chickens fenced in where the neighbor's chickens currently peck through.
Is there water?
Locals always tell me 'Water is the most important thing' or 'Water is the fluid of life' so they like water, too. You pretty much gotta have it. You can do four things here. 1. Tap municipal water. This is the best I think, for price and ease. This is what I'll do. The pipe runs very close to the property and, knock wood, it comes through good and cheap. 2. You can tap for your own water, either into the ground or from a river. This is a nice option, but probably more expensive, if you're digging, than the muni. Smaller surface rivers run dry, but good underwater rivers run all the time, keeping trees nearby lush. Those trees help lead you to the water. Not every place has this option. 3. You can pump from the lake (regionally). People do this, but I would not be happy drinking filtered lake water. 4. You can not have water. This seems like it would become a drag fast.
Is there electricity?
Using the electrical grid ended up being the best option for my purposes. Electricity is cheap here, and it would've taken years and years to pay off a simple solar electricity system that surely would need replacement parts or new batteries not to mention sourcing the parts and putting it all together. A group of three power lines runs about 12 meters from the corner of my property. The power is helpful running certain tools so it would be nice to have power for building. This gets confusing. The electric company has a rule that you can't hook up power until you have a house. The loophole is that the neighbor between myself and the power pole can agree to have an electric counter (that I pay for) put in and and I can 'steal' electricity from that until I have a house up. I'm not sure this will actually work because they don't have a house up either. We'll see. I think it'll be easy, we'll see.
Do you have a right of access to your own property?
This means: are you allowed to walk to your own property? On the mountain, getting somewhere can involve either a public path or going through someone's property or both at the same time. Some properties I was shown would've required leaving the public path and crossing private property to get home. This could be fine for years and years with all your visitors perhaps or the landowner could have a problem and then you have a problem. Public path goes from the village right to the corner of my place then through it. I have no issue getting there. We're talking dirt walking paths here. There could be a bit of a grey area here as to what is considered a 'public trail' and what's private but the people seem to know. There is one more thing. If what's considered a 'public trail' runs through your property and you intend to fence it off, you must provide alternate trail access for the people. My property has an obviously public path running through it from the middle of the top to halfway down the side. Our first work project is to rework the path to the property corner. We'll smooth it out really nice and at each side add a rock seat area for people carrying firewood or bags of crops to rest. There is another trail through my place, but I'm told it's not public. It is well smaller but I know some people use it (and throw their trash on it). I'm very sorry, but people will have to detour around a bit. They are welcome to stop and rest at my resting area. I hope to not have a problem here. I wrestled, and still wrestle, with myself about whether or not to have a fence and what type of fence to build. Even though I waver, I've long since decided a fence was best for the place I want and the visitors I'd like. There's a group of well-intentioned people, neighbor's chickens and chuchos who need to have a reason not to wander in. If a real thief wants in, they're gonna come in but a fence is pretty necessary.
How far is it from a town? How far is it from a road?
In terms of getting materials there, you can build a house anywhere if you have some extra money for dragging materials up the paths to those places by hand. In some places, there's water and power, but i's an hour and a half walk from the boat. Much of your material will come in by truck, so the closer a truck can get, the better. My closest access will be at the road right where Shad's hotel is. It should be about a ten-minute walk up. I won't be super happy watching young and older Mayan men struggle with heavy loads for construction at my place, and I certainly won't be too happy while I'm struggling with them (while carrying way less), but I believe in the project and having a house. Charlie said that relative to being next to the road, construction would cost me 10% more. Maybe I can offset that by always helping out with 'cargando' and I'm thrilled with my location so I'm on board. As I mentioned, Gallo Beer may add tuk tuk access to very near El Jocotel, and if they do this while I still have things to construct, it will ease the labor heavily for all time.
Where is it? Who are the neighbors?
Tranquility was a must for me. Some places were dealbroken immediately for being right in the village. Tzununa is a loud town, be it church music, stereo music, corn grinders or chuchos in the night. I will hear some of it, but my place is just on the edge of the village with a bit of a buffer. I do have neighbors at one edge point of the property. These are Kaqchikel Mayan people. There's a guy Andres and his family of wife and four young daughters. Unfortunately, I did look at four of his properties and did not end up buying. I was worried he'd hold a grudge but I ran into him at the San Pablo Day Fair yesterday and he greeted me warmly. I'll be at the top of the village so behind me is just mountain. It's all people's property and mostly farmed and harvested for something or other. There are people around and passing through, but they're quiet, friendly and often carrying something heavy and going straight home.
As far as visitors and guests arriving to the hotel, I think it's cool that people will be forced to go right through the village to get there. Lomas and the Moon Lodge are not part of the village. Shad will be and we will be. We are in the village. What people have to say at the hill climb required, that's up in the air. I like it and I'll be in shape.
Is it geographically safe?
I just mentioned living on the same slope as the local people. Doing so gives me comfort that no rocks bigger than my house will roll down and crush my own while I sleep or that I won't wake up swimming in a soup of mud and rock sludge barreling down to the valley below. This is where a lot of gringoes throw Mayan caution to the wind and build right in a spot they like in a dangerous valley or right next to a rising lake. Sure, your house may be safe for five years or even all of your lifetime, but there were storms that devastated here in both 2005 and 2009 so the occurence of another couldn't come as a surprise. Tzununa's river is known to jump and carry over to unknown places. Because of property, trees, deception, magic, and lack of easy access to detailed topographical information, it's often really hard to understand the contours of the land, especially in dry season, and figure out what the water will do. Remember, these are huge mountains and a lot of water spills out and when it comes it happens fast.
I've never actively looked for land in the US or any other place, so I can't compare it. Here, it's quite tiring. It's generally hot and sunny, especially in the morning. I joke that you can get two things done per day here. One in the morning, and one in the afternoon, give or take. If you blow one of those looking at land, you've blown one maybe taking a boat, maybe a tuk-tuk, but probably walking uphill and scrambling around steep, rocky, unkempt squares of the mountain. Unkempt isn't a reason to write off land so you have to give due diligence around through the brush as tall as you to try to quickly imagine where a house might go and the degree of impossibilty of constructing in that location. The person escorting you has strong odds of being sheisty and their company can be a drag or can be tolerable.
Here's how it works commonly, not exclusively. An owner puts it out there in the aether that heshe would sell a certain piece of land if someone was buying. Anyone interested (in quickly becoming a real estate agent) could come by this information easily. You can show the land to all the gringoes you want and if you bring an eventual buyer into the owner, you get paid. For this reason, multiple people may show you the same spot, a great waste of time and kick to the day's enthusiasm. What did Yogi say? You always find something in the last place you look. Most of the properties you're shown are a bust and dealbroken quickly for one reason or another(e.g., no water, too far, too loud, too steep). At that point, you figure out how to most quickly have the scout take you over to the next place and address a new set of measurements and asking price.
In my assessment below, I could see many gringoes disagreeing with me on a couple things. I was willing to sacrifice lake proximity and view for other advantages and securities. After you've chosen a village, here's what you need to ask for about the piece of land:
How big should it be?
Guatemala deals in cuerdas, which is pretty Guatemala because a cuerda can be anything from a bathroom tile to Lake Huron. I'm joking. A saving grace is that, I think, Guatemala uses the smallest version of a cuerda, 25m x 25m. I was looking for three to six cuerdas. Bigger would've been fine, but price was likely to prohibit. I ended up with six cuerdas, about an acre, which I'm thrilled about. The place is plenty large and spread out, and I hope it always feels that way with way less coffee and a few simple structures. It should be plenty of space for casitas, kitchen, chickens, garden and yoga. What's tricky about this aspect of the search is that a lot of gringoes end up buying up and combining several different properties into one, so that option is always there if you have interest and someone to help do the owner research. There is land open around El Jocotel, but that'll have to be later and hotel owners keep telling me 'don't let it get too big'.
What's the slope like?
People build on almost any kind of slope. Examples are close around. They know exactly how to excavate, refill, and build retaining walls and flat surfaces. It's still a lot of work and it leads to a very vertical life. If you succeed in finding flatter land, you've probably sacrificed your perfectly splendid lake view, and this is what I did. My land resembles the top of the cross section of an airfoil. The upper limit is nice and gentle, sloped, but softly not requiring much excavation to flatten out. This will unearth rocks all of which whill be used in building. I'll put the structures nearer the top, where it's flatter with better view. Garden and trees below. Good spot for chickens fenced in where the neighbor's chickens currently peck through.
Is there water?
Locals always tell me 'Water is the most important thing' or 'Water is the fluid of life' so they like water, too. You pretty much gotta have it. You can do four things here. 1. Tap municipal water. This is the best I think, for price and ease. This is what I'll do. The pipe runs very close to the property and, knock wood, it comes through good and cheap. 2. You can tap for your own water, either into the ground or from a river. This is a nice option, but probably more expensive, if you're digging, than the muni. Smaller surface rivers run dry, but good underwater rivers run all the time, keeping trees nearby lush. Those trees help lead you to the water. Not every place has this option. 3. You can pump from the lake (regionally). People do this, but I would not be happy drinking filtered lake water. 4. You can not have water. This seems like it would become a drag fast.
Is there electricity?
Using the electrical grid ended up being the best option for my purposes. Electricity is cheap here, and it would've taken years and years to pay off a simple solar electricity system that surely would need replacement parts or new batteries not to mention sourcing the parts and putting it all together. A group of three power lines runs about 12 meters from the corner of my property. The power is helpful running certain tools so it would be nice to have power for building. This gets confusing. The electric company has a rule that you can't hook up power until you have a house. The loophole is that the neighbor between myself and the power pole can agree to have an electric counter (that I pay for) put in and and I can 'steal' electricity from that until I have a house up. I'm not sure this will actually work because they don't have a house up either. We'll see. I think it'll be easy, we'll see.
Do you have a right of access to your own property?
This means: are you allowed to walk to your own property? On the mountain, getting somewhere can involve either a public path or going through someone's property or both at the same time. Some properties I was shown would've required leaving the public path and crossing private property to get home. This could be fine for years and years with all your visitors perhaps or the landowner could have a problem and then you have a problem. Public path goes from the village right to the corner of my place then through it. I have no issue getting there. We're talking dirt walking paths here. There could be a bit of a grey area here as to what is considered a 'public trail' and what's private but the people seem to know. There is one more thing. If what's considered a 'public trail' runs through your property and you intend to fence it off, you must provide alternate trail access for the people. My property has an obviously public path running through it from the middle of the top to halfway down the side. Our first work project is to rework the path to the property corner. We'll smooth it out really nice and at each side add a rock seat area for people carrying firewood or bags of crops to rest. There is another trail through my place, but I'm told it's not public. It is well smaller but I know some people use it (and throw their trash on it). I'm very sorry, but people will have to detour around a bit. They are welcome to stop and rest at my resting area. I hope to not have a problem here. I wrestled, and still wrestle, with myself about whether or not to have a fence and what type of fence to build. Even though I waver, I've long since decided a fence was best for the place I want and the visitors I'd like. There's a group of well-intentioned people, neighbor's chickens and chuchos who need to have a reason not to wander in. If a real thief wants in, they're gonna come in but a fence is pretty necessary.
How far is it from a town? How far is it from a road?
In terms of getting materials there, you can build a house anywhere if you have some extra money for dragging materials up the paths to those places by hand. In some places, there's water and power, but i's an hour and a half walk from the boat. Much of your material will come in by truck, so the closer a truck can get, the better. My closest access will be at the road right where Shad's hotel is. It should be about a ten-minute walk up. I won't be super happy watching young and older Mayan men struggle with heavy loads for construction at my place, and I certainly won't be too happy while I'm struggling with them (while carrying way less), but I believe in the project and having a house. Charlie said that relative to being next to the road, construction would cost me 10% more. Maybe I can offset that by always helping out with 'cargando' and I'm thrilled with my location so I'm on board. As I mentioned, Gallo Beer may add tuk tuk access to very near El Jocotel, and if they do this while I still have things to construct, it will ease the labor heavily for all time.
Where is it? Who are the neighbors?
Tranquility was a must for me. Some places were dealbroken immediately for being right in the village. Tzununa is a loud town, be it church music, stereo music, corn grinders or chuchos in the night. I will hear some of it, but my place is just on the edge of the village with a bit of a buffer. I do have neighbors at one edge point of the property. These are Kaqchikel Mayan people. There's a guy Andres and his family of wife and four young daughters. Unfortunately, I did look at four of his properties and did not end up buying. I was worried he'd hold a grudge but I ran into him at the San Pablo Day Fair yesterday and he greeted me warmly. I'll be at the top of the village so behind me is just mountain. It's all people's property and mostly farmed and harvested for something or other. There are people around and passing through, but they're quiet, friendly and often carrying something heavy and going straight home.
As far as visitors and guests arriving to the hotel, I think it's cool that people will be forced to go right through the village to get there. Lomas and the Moon Lodge are not part of the village. Shad will be and we will be. We are in the village. What people have to say at the hill climb required, that's up in the air. I like it and I'll be in shape.
Is it geographically safe?
I just mentioned living on the same slope as the local people. Doing so gives me comfort that no rocks bigger than my house will roll down and crush my own while I sleep or that I won't wake up swimming in a soup of mud and rock sludge barreling down to the valley below. This is where a lot of gringoes throw Mayan caution to the wind and build right in a spot they like in a dangerous valley or right next to a rising lake. Sure, your house may be safe for five years or even all of your lifetime, but there were storms that devastated here in both 2005 and 2009 so the occurence of another couldn't come as a surprise. Tzununa's river is known to jump and carry over to unknown places. Because of property, trees, deception, magic, and lack of easy access to detailed topographical information, it's often really hard to understand the contours of the land, especially in dry season, and figure out what the water will do. Remember, these are huge mountains and a lot of water spills out and when it comes it happens fast.
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