Permits

Probably by the time anyone reads this it will be out of date. On the other hand with luck construction permits in Costa Rica (and not having them) will hopefully still be less risky than it is in England an the US. I think the chances of having the authorities come and throw you out of your house or knock it down are pretty slim.

Having said that, my feeling is that it is better to have building permits than not.

Here are some of things to be aware of:

• The Costa Rican environmental institution, MINAE, is quite powerful and now requires property owners to obtain concessions where they intend to obtain water from springs or rivers rather than from the Costa Rican water authority (AyA).

The basic permits process can be broken down into three fairly logical steps:

1. You make sure your property is properly registered. This is called the Plan Catastro. It will need stamping by different public institutions.
2. You get some plans of your house drawn up to enable it to be valued by Costa Rica's institute of architects and engineers (CFIA in Spanish). The CFIA's fee is small, maybe 0.5% or less.
3. You take the project evaluation to the National Insurance Institute (INS) who charge a larger fee for insuring your workers against accidents, about 2% I think.
4. With your insurance certificate, architectural plans, Plan Catastro and related certifications you are ready to submit everything to the local municipality (municipalidad). Its fee is between the INS and CFIA's, toward the high side, approximately 1.5%.

So a small house with a $40,000 valuation would have to pay the CFIA around $200, the INS about $800 and the municipalidad around $700 - in total a little less than $2,000 in permits / taxes.

In theory you can do most of this yourself but it is common to get an architect or engineer to help.