Where would you most like to retire?
 

A short poll to show where some of us would like to retire.

Can't vote I'm afraid - I live in the Pacific in the Eastern hemisphere.....

I voted for South America because Central America isn't an option. Costa Rica. Tax benefits, excellent quality of living, very safe, and beautiful Carribean or Pacific Beaches.

CR is a great place unfortunately it has sub standard air service :(

Ridley maybe you could make it Central/South America to make BA happy. I'm sure RN1 gets the picture :confused:

Figured out all the poll problems, and instead of having 2 polls, we now have 1 proper one.

Hope this makes more sense.

UK ???

747pilot--

Substandard? How so? Continental goes in there twice a day out of Houston, and out of Newark as well every day. You can connect almost anywhere in the world that way. (Especially after the CAL-DAL-NW codeshare deal goes through).

If you mean internal, okay I agree there, they could use some bigger equipment. But, the Caravans seem to make them all money and they run a good operation with them.

Just my $.02

BA a few CO narrow bodies operating from IAH & EWR a couple times a day IMO is marginal and the domestic service well I think you covered that.

747,

I'll agree with you that SJO definately isn't YYZ with respect to traffic volume. But, you can get almost any US airline out of there. (Delta to ATL, AA to MIA, UAL -through flight via Guatamala City- from ORD or LAX). That doesn't include any of the Latin American airlines (TACA, COPA -which I have flown and love- Mexicana, etc...). Anyways, it's not just narrow-bodies headed down there. CAL flies 757's out of IAH (okay, not a widebody like yours... :D but not necessarily a narrowbody.)

Anyways, I just recommend people look at Costa Rica as a nice place. Just my opinion...

There's definitely more service than I thought thanks for all the info BA do you travel through SJO often?

747--

Before I took my year LOA to fly in Africa, I went to SJO at least once a month or so. I do a lot of rafting down there, and am trying to get a part-time job (very hard for a non-Costa Rican) with one of the rafting companies. When I'm back to work in December, I'll be going through there a lot again (at least once a month). The only downside is no direct YYZ service... :(

Direct service from YZ would be nice but as you pointed out there's lots of US gateway cities offering direct service that are easily assessible from YZ.

We have had a number of our pilots commuting from SJO to YZ & VR for tax reasons over the years and all of them have moved up to Caribbean domicles offering easier and more direct non-stop service.

The last time I was there was while transitting the Panama Canal and it really was a fairly short visit but it did seem fairly modern with a good lifestyle.

What's the crime like there?

747--

There is very little serious crime in Costa Rica, to speak of. According to the US State Dept., the biggest crimes are mugging and theft. (http://usembassy.or.cr/osac.html) The threat of terrorism or violent crime is "non-existant". The biggest risk is that they lie in an Earthquake zone.

I think for the cost of living, you can't beat it for retirement. (I will agree, though that for just relaxing on the beach in a five-star hotel with full amenities, the Islands are probably a better bet. Just a lot more expensive.)

Bad Andy
 

I noticed this group of airline pilots in another thread in this forum has a number of pretty decent looking places in Costa Rica To see them but i don't know where any of them are.

Do you have a favorite place to stay when you're there?

Scooby Doo
 

I find your investment intriguing I assume you've been flying in the Emirates for a while and enjoy the lifestyle and I'm sure there are considerable tax advantages.

Are you planning on retiring there or are you intending to flip the property in the future and retire elsewhere?

Definitely an interesting website I would just wonder about the resale market when the time came to sell if it would be there or not.

My thinking exactly hopefully Scooby will elaborate on that for us.

Personally I can't see any market at all I remember when my husband went for an interview to fly for Saudi in 1984 in Kansas City and the first day of a 2 day process was what they referred to as a "Cultural Orientation" he left immediately after that and told me there was no way he was taking me and his 2 daughters there!

From what I've heard I think it may have changed a lot since then. :)