Due diligence is the period in which your lawyer tries to prove the house is worse than the listing. That sounds harsh. It is the only mood that fits. Costa Rica’s registry is public and, on its own terms, quite good. It is also narrow. A spotless folio can sit on a lot with the wrong fences, an expired water letter, a permit that was never closed, or a person who has treated the land as theirs for years without ever filing a page. See Taxes and legal guide.
Hire counsel who acts only for you. Then give them time. The checklist below is the minimum Chris expects to see discussed before a buyer releases escrow, not a substitute for the attorney’s own list.
The registry, and its edges
Every titled property has a folio real at the Registro Nacional. It shows the owner, the area, liens, easements, and filings already presented. The survey plan, the plano catastrado, lives with the Cadastre. Anyone can open a basic online search after creating an account; that look-up is free. A certified report, the certificación literal, carries an official tariff. Confirm the current fee on the registry’s own schedule rather than from a blog. Order the certified version anyway.
Read the folio for annotations, not just the name at the top. Then send a licensed surveyor to the ground. The plan and the walls should describe the same piece of earth. They often do not, especially where a garden has crept, a driveway is shared, or the high-tide line is part of the story.
The registry will not show occupants, a boundary fight that has not been reduced to a filing, or a fraudulent document presented after your search. Third-party possession does not appear until a court judgment is registered. That is why a physical visit and a caretaker plan matter on vacant land, and why the registry is checked again on the morning you sign.
The seller, the town, and the water
Confirm that the person signing can bind the owner. Corporate sellers need a clean look at who has authority, and at the company’s own debts and history if you are buying shares rather than the land. Ask for the municipal tax certificate and the property declaration, which is filed on a five-year cycle. Unpaid municipal taxes follow the property. So do questions about building permits and approved plans.
If the construction value is high enough to meet the luxury-home tax, that exposure belongs in the file before you inherit the next January payment. The threshold and the brackets are on their own page. Do not let a seller’s “we’re under it” stand without the municipal valuation.
Water stops more coastal lots than title ever does. A construction permit needs a current carta de disponibilidad de agua from AyA or the local ASADA. An old letter, or a promise to get one later, is not a letter. Private wells generally need their own concession from the water authority and are a weak backup. Inside a master community the developer may have solved water for the whole tract. Confirm that the solution covers this lot, not the entrance monument.
Insurance products, alerts, and the last day
Buyers sometimes ask for title insurance because that is what they buy at home. Sources here disagree. Some describe optional title-guaranty products, usually discussed when a lender wants one. Other attorneys say there is no equivalent and that diligence is the protection. This site does not pick a winner and does not quote a premium. Ask your lawyer whether any product exists for this parcel and what it refuses to cover. Concession land is not the same conversation as titled land.
If something is unresolved at closing, do not close “subject to” a handshake. The attorney should negotiate a holdback, a credit, or a reduced price, with the condition written down. After the deed is recorded, enroll the property in the registry’s Alerta Registral. It emails you when a filing touches the folio. The official tariff cited for 2026 is US $15 a year per property. The alert detects a filing. It does not stop one.
Vacant land is where squatting, precarismo, shows up. The practical habits are unglamorous: a caretaker or a manager who walks the place, dated photos, fences, signs, and taxes kept current. None of that replaces the alert. Together they are how an owner who lives somewhere else stays the owner.