Buying a rural property in Argentina is HARD

[expat0tree]

My wife and I never imagined it would be this hard to find a modest, older rural house on couple of hectares of land; the real estate industry here in Argentina is very primitive and it has become a real pain in the azz to locate our future home, something that should have been transparent and straight forward at this day and age, especially considering that Argentina is talking about opening up to the world now.

Generally we would avoid exposing our personal life experiences to the public but considering the magnitude of the problem, we believe it's important to share our story with the online community so that all those potential expats who dream of a beautiful property in Argentina can be more prepared and less naive about the process.


Since mid-2015 we began searching for our dream rural property online, using websites like mercado libre, alamaula, buscadorprop, agroads, etc.. and what we discovered is that many of the listings are fake and many others have distorted or hidden information which really defeats the purpose of listing anything online, it's unreliable. Also under the "dueno" category we found many realtors pretending to be the owners or relatives of owners until the very last moment when the conversation turns to putting together a sales agreement through the realtor's office, so now we avoid them like fire, here are the reasons:


First of all, most realtors (this is not an exaggeration) here in Argentina are not responsive and are very arrogant, they think they are doing you a favor by paying any attention to you. We were shocked to not only not receive phone calls back when we were anxious to learn about the newly-found listing but to also punctually arrive at their office for pre-arranged appointment and then wait for an entire hour until they were available to speak with us, this type of customer service would be unheard of anywhere in north america.

But those things are just annoyances and we learned to accept them as part of the Argentine culture, what's really troubling though is the fact that they lie about the legal status of the documents on properties that they want to "dump fast". When we ask them if the title is complete, they say "yes sure", "titulos perfectos" they add, but then after wasting a couple of weeks of back-and-forth phone conversations and taking time off work to visit the property it turns out that the property does not have a proper "escritura" or that it was an inheritance and that we would be subjected to potential lawsuit from the relatives of the deceased parents if we buy it.

Many properties turn out to be under the category of "sucession" but with "permiso de occupacion" with no real ownership and no re-sale potential, or sometimes there is some legal "poder" living in Spain that cannot come and sign but don't worry, you can still go ahead and pay us your life-savings, just stop expecting to own a legal title because it's optional (that's what they want you to believe), in other words, you can literally buy a property and go live there without even being the owner of that property and then once you build yourself a house you can expect to be kicked out by the original title holder, but they won't tell you that.


One classic problem with documentation, at least here in Buenos Aires province, is the civil code change in 2015 that mandates every ownership transfer to include the plans of the house in the escritura, something that was not mandatory in the past when many people built their homes illegally without any architectural designs or drawings, so now that they want to sell their 2 hectare hobby farm with an old, poorly build (no foundation!) collapsing house, they expect the buyer to pay for new plans on a house that will most likely be demolished after the purchase.

Since when is it the buyer's problem that the seller has no money to make new plans?


With private property sellers we reduced our expectations drastically, we no longer want a half decent house with good paved acces, we are okay now with a s#$%^y rotten house with bad wiring, leaky pipes and overgrown garden somewhere on a dirt road away from civilization - as long as the papers are right and the owner is reasonable in regards to asking-price and straight forward about the existing problems, but even that proves to be difficult since the owners are doing their absolute best to hide as much as they can.

They lie about the age of the structure, construction details, volume of existing water on property, soil quality, access issues etc..

But why hide it if the buyer is likely to investigate anyways? And once they find you lied about one little thing, they won't trust you again. Is the Argentine buyer really that stupid that lying has become a normal way of convincing them into buying real estate?

Nobody wants to waste their money for nothing especially when speaking of hard earned savings. It's hard to understand the Argentine mind-set, often times they behave much like the realtors, acting like they are doing you a favorite by picking up their phone.

There are times when we just want to say: "Do you want to sell your property or not? Make up your mind sir." And maybe they are not in hurry to sell, after all, Argentine's aren't exactly motivated by new opportunities...

In north america the buyer is the one doing a favor by offering money in exchange for a property that is eager and ready to sell, apparently in Argentina the law of gravity does not work.

Is it a crime to want to know everything about the property? Yes I want to see the roof please because that will affect my offering price, and why is it unreasonable to make a lower offer if we see that your property is going to require back-breaking labor for the next ten years?

Negotiating is hard here but we are more patience now and taking it slow, knowing that rural real estate requires special attention and infinite caution. Now we know why so many people are buying apartments in "pozo" and empty lots, because it's headache-free and yet it should be infinitely easier to buy small rural hobby farm that urban people aren't interested in anyways, go figure...

 

[sts7049]

thanks for sharing that...quite a disaster. and yet, completely unsurprising haha. this just reaffirms my intention to keep my life as simple as possible while i'm living here for work.

it is incredible that you started this in 2015 and still haven't been able to buy anything.

 

[jeff1234]

Many of the self-defeating behaviors you describe among the sellers and brokers, echo the complaints posted to this forum about landlords, bosses, business people.
Speaking strictly as an observer it sounds like they are clinging to old customs and haven't yet faced a world where buyers are more informed and more savvy than the locals they used to deal with.

 

[steveinbsas]

My wife and I never imagined it would be this hard to find a modest, older rural house on couple of hectares of land.

Having purchaased a "semi-rural" property in Provincia Bs. As. in 2010, I read your story with great interest and a great deal of sympathy.

Generally we would avoid exposing our personal life experiences to the public but considering the magnitude of the problem, we believe it's important to share our story with the online community so that all those potential expats who dream of a beautiful property in Argentina can be more prepared and less naive about the process.

I was fortunate enough to find the "casa quinta" I bought on line on the second day of my search.

One classic problem with documentation, at least here in Buenos Aires province, is the civil code change in 2015 that mandates every ownership transfer to include the plans of the house in the escritura, something that was not mandatory in the past when many people built their homes illegally without any architectural designs or drawings, so now that they want to sell their 2 hectare hobby farm with an old, poorly build (no foundation!) collapsing house, they expect the buyer to pay for new plans on a house that will most likely be demolished after the purchase.

Fortunately, the previous owners had several businesses here and because of the constant scrutiny (as well as being in a municipal zone), they had excellent plans for the house (even though I bought it in 2010) and the previous owner was a master craftsman when it came to construction as well as finish work.

With private property sellers we reduced our expectations drastically, we no longer want a half decent house with good paved acces, we are okay now with a s#$%^y rotten house with bad wiring, leaky pipes and overgrown garden somewhere on a dirt road away from civilization - as long as the papers are right and the owner is reasonable in regards to asking-price and straight forward about the existing problems, but even that proves to be difficult since the owners are doing their absolute best to hide as much as they can.

I am presently interested in selling my house and some of the land and moving into the building directly behind the house. I will pay the entire cost of legally subdividing the property after the escritura. I could either live there indefinitely or for a year or so if sell the property with both buildings and build on the lot "next door" (as outlined in the first of the threads I link to below). Either way, a legal subdivision would be required.

They lie about the age of the structure, construction details, volume of existing water on property, soil quality, access issues etc..

But why hide it if the buyer is likely to investigate anyways? And once they find you lied about one little thing, they won't trust you again. Is the Argentine buyer really that stupid that lying has become a normal way of convincing them into buying real estate?

Why would I hide anything if I want the buyer to be my next door neighbor?

Is it a crime to want to know everything about the property? Yes I want to see the roof please because that will affect my offering price, and why is it unreasonable to make a lower offer if we see that your property is going to require back-breaking labor for the next ten years?

I can show a potential buyer everything that needs to be done. If I don't I won't have a neighbor who has my back or can watch my property if I want to travel. That will not happen often if the past eight years are any indication. I have slept under the same roof every night since June 26th 20010 (without exception)

Negotiating is hard here but we are more patience now and taking it slow, knowing that rural real estate requires special attention and infinite caution. Now we know why so many people are buying apartments in "pozo" and empty lots, because it's headache-free and yet it should be infinitely easier to buy small rural hobby farm that urban people aren't interested in anyways, go figure...

If you like my house and the location as much as I do, it wont be hard to negotiate and I'm realistic about the value (about the same as a same size house in need of a total rehab (with no side yard) in Punta Alta.

Here's a thread I started in 2014 about living in a semi-rural area (within a municipal zone and not subject to the "protection" of the policia provincial).

Country Life In Argentina: What's It Really Like?

And here's the thread I started last year:

So I've Decided To Sell My House But Where Will I Go?

My house is 1.1 KMS from the asphalt where the (very well maintained) village plaza is located. A pharmacy, the village offices and comisaria (Policia Federal) are located at that intersection. The local medical clinic is located in a building on the opposite corner of the plaza. Small shops with competitive prices are scattered throughout the village and the stores of Punta Alta are within 10 KM. The highway is less than one KM from the plaza

PS: This is the first post I've made about selling my house in over a year. I'm in no rush to sell because I am happy living in the house. As indicated in the second thread, I'm not planning on moving very far.

PS2: The yellow house on two hectares in the photos at the end of the first thread has been sold.

 

[expat0tree]

@sts7049

Yes. It is surprising that it takes this long but it's also a good that we didn't jump into anything out of desperation. This year we are taking it particularly slow also due to the fact that many listings were taken off-line across the board by many hopeful sellers who still believe they will be able to sell at a better price after new year's. When we asked some of them why this was their line of thinking, there response was "the realtor told me it's gonna get better..." It was very surprising to us that some private sellers are trusting the realtors without thinking that perhaps realtors want want less volume in the pipe for the simple fact that their own listings were not doing too well, now things are changing, some people realized that the currency isn't going to stabilize below the 40s level and that the administration cannot care less about the purchasing power of the middle class. the market has most certainly entered into the buyers territory and will remain there until the day when improved fundamentals and higher commodity prices start filling up Argentine's coffers again, which may or may not occur towards the end of 2019-early 2020. Meantime we are keeping our eye open for new listings, although they are slow to appear which is another puzzle, why aren't more people listing their properties? the choice is so limited for the lower price range, it should be the other way around. Unless some older folk don't know or don't want to list their campo online? Curious what people have to say about that.

@jeff1234

It must be a cultural thing because even the Argentine buyer doesn't seem to mind the poor customer service, maybe they don't know any better, it took me a while to get used to long line ups at the grocery store, for example; I couldn't wrap my head around the absurdity of having to watch the verdulero fill up each bag of vegies for each indecisive grandma in line that kept on remembering what else she might need, 2 more onions, oh and a bit less strawberries. Besides the simple idea of allowing each customer to choose their own produce and avoid the waiting, they cannot even pre-pack their produce into 1-3 kg bags so that people could simply pick them up instead of watching them walk across the store for another potato because it was 1.9kg instead of 2 kg.

@steveinbsas

Thanks for your offer but we are looking for something a bit simpler at a lower price range, something that we can improve on our own (i'm a builder) we are even open to getting a campo with just a shop without a casa so that we can build a quick cabin before planning an actual house. We also prefer the rural zone since it allows for more flexibility in terms of having a large garden, an orchard and some farm animals, we are not urbanites by any means.

 

[nikad]

I don't think the best place to look for rural properties is online at all. My ex father in law was a well known notary in Chivilcoy, Bs As. He would buy and sell land and real estate as investment for himself as well. He also ran a real estate firm. I think your best bet is to find a reputable notary in your desired area and work from there.

 

[steveinbsas]

@steveinbsas

Thanks for your offer but we are looking for something a bit simpler at a lower price range, something that we can improve on our own (i'm a builder) we are even open to getting a campo with just a shop without a casa so that we can build a quick cabin before planning an actual house. We also prefer the rural zone since it allows for more flexibility in terms of having a large garden, an orchard and some farm animals, we are not urbanites by any means.

I also would be willing to sell the outbuilding (97 mtrs sq) for $45K USD, It's all brick construction (with a metal roof) and could be increased by 90 meters if an additional two 3 x 4mtr bedrooms and master bath are desired. A large workshop could be set up in the existing colchera. It's a DIY's dream and needs a lot of finish work, but the electrical and plumbing are already there (including a fully tiled bathroom). I've already planted olive and apple trees on the land in front of the outbuilding.

For the past 3-4 years I've been buying (from a dealer of recycled building materials)in Punta Alta) and refinishing recycled solid wood doors, windows, and portones that will give the house a vintage "estancia" appearance. I already have enough vintage furniture and accessories to completely fill the place as well as gas heaters (calefactors and calefons). Mercado Libre has been very good to me.

This option may not suit your needs, but just in case someone else who does happens to read this thread they can contact me for additional info. I will not (and cannot) sell the 5840 mtrs 2 in the back as there is no direct access form the street.. I've got several "test" gardens planted now and there's plenty of room for a corral for small livestock. (on which there are no restrictions by the municipality). I would be happy to share this land with my new neighbor.

I can understand if you want to be further out in the rural area. You can buy a larger property for less $ per square meter. I considered it but I'm glad to be where I am. I don't feel at all like I'm living in an urban area yet I'm glad Punta Alta is so close and even happier that the local medical clinic, police station, and many shops are all about 1 KM from my house. I rarely leave my house for more than a few hours. Nothing has ever happened while I wasn't home and no one has ever tried to break in at night. One local kid tried to swipe my laptop off my kitchen table while I was working outside but I was able to thwart the theft with the help of three young men who happened to be driving past the house at the time of the attempted robbery.

Frankly, I consider myself very fortunate to have found a place as safe as it has been during the past eight years. The more rural you go, the more dangerous it gets and with the economy still going south it's likely to get worse "out there" before it gets better, if ever. If it's just you and your wife and you are buying a lot of construction materials you are likely to become a target for thieves. Have you given much thought to what will happen when the two of you go shopping? Will you leave your wife alone at home? A lot of people (including the drivers for the materials you have delivered) are going to know there is a new foreigner living in their area...a new foreigner who has money to spend and presumably has money at home.

Other xpats have had to deal with these issues.

You may have already read these post about having to spend $30K pesos per month (when the peso may have been less than 8 to 1) to "enjoy" country life in Argentina::

We love the country life, the only thing that we did not account for were the security issues and the associated cost that this brings. It can be upward of $30,000ar a month, plus the cost of another house...

...We started with bare land around 50ha, built house, barn, shed,etc believing life would be great with a young family(so wrong) security problems made us decide to move into a private country club. As you know leaving anything unattended is not possible, so employing people to be present 24-7 is necessary, both in the white plus bonuses. We found out the hard way that cheap is not cheap when hiring here. Add police, alarms, fencing, security connection, dogs, country club, that eats +30.

Here's a recent thread regarding Living in the country safely

Estancias around Madariaga get robbed regularly. A friend of mine was robbed four times in a row, fortunately while he was away. His neighbor was held up at gunpoint, the whole family was herded and locked into a bathroom, and the house was thoroughly looted.

This took place in a smaller city but the point is that foreigners are targets:

Robbed In Epuyen, Theives Caught Then Released, Even Though

https://www.baexpats.org/threads/robbed-in-epuyen-theives-caught-then-released-even-though.35315/

Here's the first post (from April 16, 2016):

We came to Epuyen to find a quite, peaceful place to live, and we have been living the dream here for 6 months. We were recently robbed of our tranquility, peace by 5 men, and others who did the surveillance. then after they were caught we were robbed again of our peace of mind by a Judge who let them free.

On a rainy Sunday right after the electric was cut, my wife and son were taking a nap, so I went to the Panaderia less than 5 minutes from my house to get them a treat for when they woke up.

While I was gone 4 men came to my house, my dog started barking, my wife woke up and went outside to see why the dog was going nuts. As she opened the door the 4 men ran up to her with a gun pointed at her head. They forced her inside and 2 of them started searching the house and taking things. Mean while the other 2 men tied her up with wire and beat her. They kept asking her where did your husband go? She didnt know because she was asleep. The men put the gun in her mouth and ask where all the money was. she told them where the money we had was and they took it and my coin collection.

They kept telling her we know you have 400000 pesos to buy land, where is it. She told them they were idiots we were going to get a loan to buy the land and we didnt have that kind of money. They also threatened her with my son, she told them to take everything its all we had. After approximately 10 minutes the men all ran out and she heard them shut the door.

She ran to my neighbors house after untying herself with the help of my son. The police caught the thieves within 2 days, arrested them with some of our possessions in their homes in Bariloche. They also had dollars, 1 kilo of cocaine and 1 kilo of pot.

The men went to court and the Judge let them out.

These people robbed only 2 families us in Epuyen, and an ex politician in El Hoyo. They played Russian Roulette with the man they robbed in El Hoyo, yet the Judge let them free, and these same men have killed a delivery man, and stabbed another one they were robbing.

The moral of this story is there are no longer safe quiet places, always be ready for the wild west, because evil is now all over Argentina. Peace and tranquility are illusions, you must be prepared for everything to protect yourself!

Later in the thread it was revealed that the thieves cut the electricity to the entire town to commit this robbery.

And CityGirl posted this in the same thread:

I told the story about when we were getting robbed by an ex-employee several times over a 2 month period a few years ago. He was camping out behind our property and then would break in. At one point, we discovered the campsite along with some of our stolen property. We literally brought the police to the site, showed it to them, told them his name, etc. They a) refused to recover the property and B) told us we couldn't touch it. (Because lots of homeless people have concrete mixers, saws, water dispensers and kitchen utensils, clothing, etc ) Anyway, they told us they would "watch the site like a hawk" and "wait for him to come back to question him". 5 minutes later they left. A few hours later, we took all of our stuff back. When they stopped back the next day, they told us they had been watching it the entire time. Um..no.

They never bothered to question him, let alone arrest him. He went out to rob multiple other properties around here. He finally stopped b/c he had a run in with someone and got shot while setting his father's car on fire after an argument. Last I heard, he got out after just a month or so. (And this was with with an EXTENSIVE prior record).

Criminal justice system here is a joke.

So sorry about your breakin. I know the feeling - it's just absolutely awful. All the good thoughts to you.

And Here's A Little Story...


The bottom line: If you think buying a rural property in Argentina is hard, just wait until you try to live there.

 

[expat0tree]

@nikad
Thanks for the idea, what also makes us search challenging is the lack of connections. Would you recommend any reputable notaries in the rural Buenos Aires province? Do they not have websites with listings?

@steveinbsas
I disagree about the safety issue with the rural properties. If your property is low-key, meaning if you don't have a fancy swimming pool and a huge casa and crazy truck and don't come across as a foreigner who is full of cash then there is no reason to be worried about safety. Of course we'll have a proper fence and lots of trees for privacy, dogs and all that is necessary to be protected on a basic level. The main thing though is that we do not come across as wealthy foreigners anyways, we don't even dress up nice and our cellphones are old and cracked so nobody would think of us as a target.

Would I leave my wife alone? Sure why not. Do you really think that the entire rural Argentina is on a lock down? I don't think so, there are dangerous areas such as west of Greater Buenos Aires area, and other areas as well, but we are not going to live close to a villa where people deal drugs and shoot each other because of petty crimes, we want to live in a small community and know our immediate neighbors, that should be enough to guarantee basic safety, beyond that there is a greater risk of dying due to a car crush or poor health than robbery.

 

[Bajo_cero2]

I don't think the best place to look for rural properties is online at all. My ex father in law was a well known notary in Chivilcoy, Bs As. He would buy and sell land and real estate as investment for himself as well. He also ran a real estate firm. I think your best bet is to find a reputable notary in your desired area and work from there.

I agree, on line you are only going to find frauds.

Have you considered San Luis or Mendoza?

 

[expat0tree]

@Bajo_cero2

Generally, we are flexible and open to relocating anywhere in the country, the reason why we are focused on Buenos Aires province for now is because it's easier to go visit and investigate via local escrow's office, but if a remote property in another province has a detailed description, enough photos and all the paperwork in order and ready for transfer, and the seller is willing to come to BA to collect their money (we are not going to travel with cash) then in theory the transaction can take place, it's just that people don't have all the info and when asked about well water, for example, they have no idea how deep it is, once they realized you aren't going to travel in order to check they lie about having 2,3 wells and then later it turns out there are no wells at all, we did this once already and felt cheated, water is crucial for us and can't be gambled with.

Mendoza is lovely but it has serious water issues and drilling a well from scratch would probably cost a lot, plus there is a risk ending up with too deep of a well for pumping, electricity has gone up and will continue to cost more in the future as demand continues climbing at 6-7% a year, unless someone can prove us wrong in regards to drilling a basic domestic well (3 inch thick with medium output), please do tell if that's the case, is there a map showing subterranean aquifers that we aren't aware of? or at least a public log showing all the drilled registered wells in Mendoza with their numbers such as depth and pumping volumes? The legality of water is a total mystery to us, we would probably have to bribe some officials to put us on priority list for drilling a registered well in Mendoza if many people are waiting for approval already, we already know that many of them have illegal wells and even steal water from irrigation canals, we don't want to do that, the bureaucratic process is too inefficient and therefor risky, that could lead to more complications, maybe it's safer to just look in naturally wet provinces.

Misiones comes to mind but there aren't too many listings online, wonder where they all are?

San Luis is beautiful too, I spent countless hours exploring the province on Google Earth, Merlos area and the Champaqui mountains are gorgeous on both sides, Yacanto on Cordoba's side is phenomenal, even the north eastern mountain range from San Luis capital is nice with affordable terrenos enlisted online but no cabins there, just bare land and potable water comes to mind again, no one there seems to have drilled wells, we don't see too many properties with a creeks, unless we haven't seen some other listings that we are not aware of?

We get the feeling that there are some private sellers online somewhere that google search cannot find or some remote communities that have some information online on their local municipal website maybe, any recommendations are most certainly welcome.

There must be a better way to look for private sales of rural properties other than filtering through fakes on mercado libre and alamaula.