The search for a great realtor in Costa Rica may sometimes seem like a daunting tasks. But there are a few hallmarks of the best realtors that can tell you that this person will go above and beyond in representing you in your Costa Rica real estate transactions. Finding a great realtor in Costa Ballena (the area from North of Dominical to South of Ojochal) is not as easy as it may seem. Some people choose their real estate agent based on global brand recognition. Others may be referred to an agent by friends and acquaintances. Still others will walk into the first local real estate office they come across and ask about what they have available for sale. 

Pocket Listings

Where problems may arise can often only be seen after a transaction has been completed; when the property purchaser may learn over time that their realtor has omitted a lot of helpful information that could have landed them a better deal. Good realtors will have a well-managed website with lots of great listings for buyers to peruse on their own time. They largely rely on their website listings to bring them new buyer leads for the properties listed in their internal system.  A great realtor will additionally have an arsenal of pocket listings that, for one reason or another, they have chosen not to market to the broader public yet. A pocket listing can be kept from being listed on an MLS service for a variety of reasons. The listing agent may not have had a chance to upload the property details (maybe there are renters in the home and the property has not yet been adequately staged to make the listing presentable). Another reason could be that the seller is a very private type person who does not yet want to share their home with the public. Some people simply don’t want to list their property because it is so unique that they prefer to quietly wait for the “perfect buyer” who wants nothing more than to buy their specific property for whatever the value the two parties deem that it is worth (the wider market may not understand why some sellers value their properties at the prices they choose and they may assume that the real estate market is being overvalued).

Off-Market Properties

A great realtor will show their buyers every property that they want to see, including those that are not quite ‘on the market.’ We know people in the local community who have abundant land for sale in Ojochal, Uvita, and Costa Rica and can approach those who we know would consider selling if the right buyer and right offer were to come to them.

Staying Informed

There is a lot to know about our dynamic real estate market in Costa Rica. Staying informed about is one of the flagstones of a good agent. A great agent will go a step beyond and update their clients on the state of the real estate market and any listing updates on a regular basis (see our latest Costa Rica Rental Market Report and our 2022 Costa Rica Real Estate Market Report for more examples of the kind of data that only Osa Tropical Properties gives their clients). A passionate realtor will show you far beyond what you can see on “MLS” sites like Point2Homes. Our office has our own ‘multiple listing service’ where we gather listing data from all over the Costa Ballena and we work hard to ensure that it is up-to-date with prices, listing status, and share all of this information on a weekly basis with our database. Want to be the most informed about real estate in Costa Ballena? Sign up to our weekly newsletter below to stay in the know about all things related to Costa Rica real estate.