The below is a work in progress. Buying real estate in Costa Rica is a knowledge intensive endeavor. Little by little the country is getting modernized to where the property that one is looking at can actually be identified clearly and its pedigree determined. But the land registration process is also a work in progress.

Costa Rica just finished this last week the enormouse project of photographing 75-80% of the country from the air, using a NASA crew and airplane. Costa Rica had a number of reasons for engaging in this project, among which are:

~ getting information on flooding and how to better manage the problem
~ identifying the where and why of deforestation
~ evaluating the country’s water sources
~ evaluating the electrical and telecommunications system
~ and perhaps most importantly, the information will be used in the massive improvement efforts with respect to the National Property Registry, and National Cadastre.

There is a lot of work to be done, but the effort stands as a clear indicator that the government here is quite serious about getting its catastro in good shape.

Main Entry: ca·das·tre
Pronunciation: k&-’das-t&r
Function: noun
Etymology: French, from Italian catastro, from Old Italian catastico, from Late Greek katastichon notebook, from Greek kata by + stichos row, line — more at CATA-, DISTICH
: an official register of the quantity, value, and ownership of real estate used in apportioning taxes

“Cadastre” is English for what we use in Spanish “catastro”. The catastro is one step toward having the property under consideration identified and its status as regards size and so on registered.

The second thing that is necessary is the “escritura” or title.

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