Borrow Against Your Caribbean Property
GAP Equity Loans helps owners in Cahuita and Puerto Viejo prepare a lender-ready private loan request. Your property is what qualifies you — no credit check, no income verification, no bank.
Loans from US$50,000 and up. Interest-only payments, terms from 6 months to 3 years, up to 50% of the property value with around 30% or less preferred. Nothing to pay up front.
A smaller market, so the file has to be tighter.
The Caribbean side is a real market with a real following, and it is nothing like Guanacaste. Prices are lower, the buyer pool is smaller and more specific, and properties can take longer to sell. None of that stops a loan. It does mean the file carries more weight.
A lender here is asking the same question as anywhere else, just harder: if this had to be sold, who buys it and how long does it take. A property with clean title, real access, water that can be demonstrated and a sensible asking price answers that. One without those does not.
Cahuita and Puerto Viejo are the two areas GAP lends in on this coast. Both have an established foreign community, steady tourism and enough transactions to support a valuation.
Location helps a file. It does not approve it. The loan amount, the title, the use of funds, the documents and the repayment plan still have to make sense.
The the Caribbean areas private lenders focus on.
- Cahuita
- Puerto Viejo
If your property is elsewhere in the region, send the details anyway. Every file is reviewed case by case.
Title and access carry more weight here than anywhere.
Title and boundaries
- Clean title in the registry, and the plano catastrado
- Whether any part of the property sits in the maritime zone
- Boundaries that match what is on the ground
- Any lien, annotation or unresolved claim
- Corporate ownership and who can sign
The practical side
- Access, and whether the road in is public
- Water, and whether a letter can be issued
- Electricity and internet
- Rental or business history if the property earns
- Municipal taxes paid up to date
If the property is held in a company.
A great deal of Costa Rica property, especially foreign-owned property, sits inside an S.A. or an S.R.L. That is not a problem for a property-backed loan. GAP arranges loans against corporate-held property regularly.
What the file needs is the corporate side in order: the company documents, a clear picture of who owns the shares, the corporation tax paid up to date, and someone with the authority to sign on the company’s behalf.
One warning worth hearing before you restructure anything. Holding property in a company can suit a loan and suit your estate planning, and still work against you somewhere else. If you are planning to use that same property to apply for residency under the investor category, immigration looks at ownership differently, and a company is generally not the way you want it held. Talk to CRIE before you move a property into or out of a company, not after.
The things that stall Caribbean requests.
A loan amount the market will not carry
This is a smaller market than the Pacific. A conservative number moves; an ambitious one usually does not, and it is better to hear that at the start.
Boundaries that do not match
Where the fence is and where the plano says the line runs are not always the same. That gets resolved before a lender will move, so resolve it first.
Maritime zone uncertainty
Anything close to the beach needs a clear answer on whether it is titled or concession. Vague is the same as no.
Send the property and the amount you need.
That is enough to begin. GAP will tell you what the file still needs, organise the property, title, equity, use of funds and repayment plan into something a private lender can review, and be straight with you about whether the number works.
There is nothing to pay up front. Once the complete file is in and due diligence is finished, qualified loans can close within 10 business days.