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Not technically, no. But Mexican presidents are dictators much in the same way that Gray Davis in California was a dictator. He had one party control and absolutely no morally compelling reason to respect the voters or the rights of those who didn't not contribute to his campaign. When the new ownership terms can up in Mexico, it was an 'elected' president who did it. And why not? Make up some tax revenue from some gringos to cover the corruption in Mexico City and stick it to those Americans who keep refusing to accept Mexicos poor and criminal unwanteds. If you go back 50 years, there have been lots and lots of changes. New changes could happen at any time and you could end up holding property which is too expensive to keep and to costly to sell.

I agree with you that Costa Rica is far superior. But what kind of control do you have over the factors governing the market there? I am certainly not an expert on Costa Rican politics and I don't have the connections there to be able to quickly establish a proxy owner there to avoid some new tax scheme there to take the money of the rich tax avoiders in North America.

If you spend adequate time to research these things, you can mitigate your risks. And then at least you will be aware of many of your risks. But the flight of capital down there is a repeating pattern which has occurred in other third world countries which have often left the second round of investors holding the bag while the first round got in early and out while the bloom was still on the rose (think Nasdaq winners like globe.com, globalcrossing, pets.com, etc.).

If you are buying in these places because you can't find better real estate investment opportunities in the U.S.(where you can infinitely more predictability), please, please, please let me know. I'd much rather see people keeping their money here and getting more solid returns AND being able to take advantage of the US tax laws which allow you to pay no taxes on your real estate investments.