Need Advice!

A lot will depend on where in Puerto Rico you want to live. There are 78 towns and they all have good areas and bad. Have you visited the island before?
Also where are you planning to work? I assume that you either already have a job lined up or do not need one.
By the way welcome to the forum
Rey

Condado

Hi Rey,

I will be looking for work but do not need one right away. I have visited a few times and spent most of my time in San Juan. I would like to move outside of San Juan. I would even consider the other end of the Island. I am also looking to purchase a home and have set up appointments with a few realtors but they don't seem as aggressive as we are in Massachusetts haha. I may even consider a job in real estate if that's the case! Thank you for replying. Do you currently live in PR?
Tania

We lived in Aguadilla with our two school-aged kids. We LOVED it. They attended Borinquen Bilingual School, but there are many, many choices of private schools in the area. Aguadilla has BQN airport and is ocean-side and all of the amenities you could ever want are in town. Additionally, it's just a short drive to get to the mountains for a nice hike or swim on the weekends.

So there you go, that's my recommendation.

Tvelez55 wrote:

Hi Rey,

I will be looking for work but do not need one right away. I have visited a few times and spent most of my time in San Juan. I would like to move outside of San Juan. I would even consider the other end of the Island. I am also looking to purchase a home and have set up appointments with a few realtors but they don't seem as aggressive as we are in Massachusetts haha. I may even consider a job in real estate if that's the case! Thank you for replying. Do you currently live in PR?
Tania

I was born in Puerto Rico and lived there until my early 20. I will be returning for good next summer and plan to die there.
I currently live in Grafton Massachusetts so we are neighbors.

Realtors are not as aggressive because they don't know if you are serious or just wasting their time. If you need a loan get that out of the way before you visit if you are going for a cash transaction you may have to show them. A lot of "gringos" come to the island, want to go house hunting and see 50 places in a week, don't want to get pre-approved and leave the island without ever making an offer, like kids in a candy store (oh this one, no, that one, maybe this other one). So they are afraid to waste their time.
My advice is to go ahead and rent a house or condo for 6 months to a year, become familiar with the island, see if it is for you and where you want to live, and what sort of place makes you happy. Then drive around on your own in the area you like and look for "Se Vende" signs. Most properties are not listed anywhere, you discover them by getting lost in the streets of the area you like. If all else fails then you get a realtor.
Do a search about realtors in this site and you will find some of my writings about it.

But basically come to the island, rent 6-12 months and then decide.

I love the east coast, many expats like the Town of Rincon and surrounding towns (Gringoland) were English is found everywhere and the beaches and terrain is similar to the California coast and surfing is king.

See this map, and click on the town names to learn a little about each town in PR (78 of them)
http://welcome.topuertorico.org/exploring.shtml

Rey,

Thank you so much! That actually makes perfect sense and we will be getting preapproved prior to our visit. I will look into renting for a short period. We are neighbors!! Hopefully we'll be neighbors in paradise too. haha

Tania

Tvelez55 wrote:

Rey,

Thank you so much! That actually makes perfect sense and we will be getting preapproved prior to our visit. I will look into renting for a short period. We are neighbors!! Hopefully we'll be neighbors in paradise too. haha

Tania

Sounds good, my wife only speaks English so she needs to meet more expats.

I know there is a private bilingual school, on Ramey Airbase (former US Airforce base, and now part of Aguadilla), their website, just look for froebelbilingualschool. I know there are more, in the area, but I've heard good things about this one. We have folks from all over the world, at our church (Church Without Walls PR), and many children attend local schools. A few I know, have decided to homeschool, as well.

Rincon, Aguada, Aguadilla and Isabela, are four communities, on the west end of the island. Many English speaking people, and having lived in Guayama, & Arroyo (about 45min east of Ponce), the west seems more laid back. I'm from NH, I've been here 11 years, and LOVE it!

ReyP wrote:

Tvelez55 wrote:

Hi Rey,

I will be looking for work but do not need one right away. I have visited a few times and spent most of my time in San Juan. I would like to move outside of San Juan. I would even consider the other end of the Island. I am also looking to purchase a home and have set up appointments with a few realtors but they don't seem as aggressive as we are in Massachusetts haha. I may even consider a job in real estate if that's the case! Thank you for replying. Do you currently live in PR?
Tania

I was born in Puerto Rico and lived there until my early 20. I will be returning for good next summer and plan to die there.
I currently live in Grafton Massachusetts so we are neighbors.

Realtors are not as aggressive because they don't know if you are serious or just wasting their time. If you need a loan get that out of the way before you visit if you are going for a cash transaction you may have to show them. A lot of "gringos" come to the island, want to go house hunting and see 50 places in a week, don't want to get pre-approved and leave the island without ever making an offer, like kids in a candy store (oh this one, no, that one, maybe this other one). So they are afraid to waste their time.
My advice is to go ahead and rent a house or condo for 6 months to a year, become familiar with the island, see if it is for you and where you want to live, and what sort of place makes you happy. Then drive around on your own in the area you like and look for "Se Vende" signs. Most properties are not listed anywhere, you discover them by getting lost in the streets of the area you like. If all else fails then you get a realtor.
Do a search about realtors in this site and you will find some of my writings about it.

But basically come to the island, rent 6-12 months and then decide.

I love the east coast, many expats like the Town of Rincon and surrounding towns (Gringoland) were English is found everywhere and the beaches and terrain is similar to the California coast and surfing is king.

When we were speaking with my family about towns we want to visit to possibly live in Puerto Rico we mentioned Rincon and wow their reaction! They basically told us that we might as well move to Florida to be around "gringos" and palm trees. I didn't realize the concentrated amount of expats there. Being that we are Puerto Rican and want to immerse ourselves in our culture and around the native people we are knocking the "gringoland" towns off the places to consider living list. I definitely understand the appeal though for English-only speaking people wanting to live there seeing that must make the transition much smoother with less culture shock.

I think that any town any where away from tourist, vacation beach seekers would be very Puerto Rican. If you want a Jibaro experience head to the hills. Great people but their Spanish is very difficult to understand. There are a lot of small towns offering basic things.

Love the country side away from the mess and in closeness with nature.

ravenmickey wrote:

ReyP wrote:

Tvelez55 wrote:

Hi Rey,

I will be looking for work but do not need one right away. I have visited a few times and spent most of my time in San Juan. I would like to move outside of San Juan. I would even consider the other end of the Island. I am also looking to purchase a home and have set up appointments with a few realtors but they don't seem as aggressive as we are in Massachusetts haha. I may even consider a job in real estate if that's the case! Thank you for replying. Do you currently live in PR?
Tania

I was born in Puerto Rico and lived there until my early 20. I will be returning for good next summer and plan to die there.
I currently live in Grafton Massachusetts so we are neighbors.

Realtors are not as aggressive because they don't know if you are serious or just wasting their time. If you need a loan get that out of the way before you visit if you are going for a cash transaction you may have to show them. A lot of "gringos" come to the island, want to go house hunting and see 50 places in a week, don't want to get pre-approved and leave the island without ever making an offer, like kids in a candy store (oh this one, no, that one, maybe this other one). So they are afraid to waste their time.
My advice is to go ahead and rent a house or condo for 6 months to a year, become familiar with the island, see if it is for you and where you want to live, and what sort of place makes you happy. Then drive around on your own in the area you like and look for "Se Vende" signs. Most properties are not listed anywhere, you discover them by getting lost in the streets of the area you like. If all else fails then you get a realtor.
Do a search about realtors in this site and you will find some of my writings about it.

But basically come to the island, rent 6-12 months and then decide.

I love the east coast, many expats like the Town of Rincon and surrounding towns (Gringoland) were English is found everywhere and the beaches and terrain is similar to the California coast and surfing is king.

When we were speaking with my family about towns we want to visit to possibly live in Puerto Rico we mentioned Rincon and wow their reaction! They basically told us that we might as well move to Florida to be around "gringos" and palm trees. I didn't realize the concentrated amount of expats there. Being that we are Puerto Rican and want to immerse ourselves in our culture and around the native people we are knocking the "gringoland" towns off the places to consider living list. I definitely understand the appeal though for English-only speaking people wanting to live there seeing that must make the transition much smoother with less culture shock.

, miracle your family did not smack you one.
My family has been drilling into me for many years about moving back to PR and get angry when I fail to visit each of them. But I need to keep my handsome figure, If I visit 5 places that is 5 plates of food in one afternoon and like 20 plates if I visit all of them in a single day which is impossible as they are scattered around east and central PR.

ReyP wrote:

ravenmickey wrote:

ReyP wrote:

I was born in Puerto Rico and lived there until my early 20. I will be returning for good next summer and plan to die there.
I currently live in Grafton Massachusetts so we are neighbors.

Realtors are not as aggressive because they don't know if you are serious or just wasting their time. If you need a loan get that out of the way before you visit if you are going for a cash transaction you may have to show them. A lot of "gringos" come to the island, want to go house hunting and see 50 places in a week, don't want to get pre-approved and leave the island without ever making an offer, like kids in a candy store (oh this one, no, that one, maybe this other one). So they are afraid to waste their time.
My advice is to go ahead and rent a house or condo for 6 months to a year, become familiar with the island, see if it is for you and where you want to live, and what sort of place makes you happy. Then drive around on your own in the area you like and look for "Se Vende" signs. Most properties are not listed anywhere, you discover them by getting lost in the streets of the area you like. If all else fails then you get a realtor.
Do a search about realtors in this site and you will find some of my writings about it.

But basically come to the island, rent 6-12 months and then decide.

I love the east coast, many expats like the Town of Rincon and surrounding towns (Gringoland) were English is found everywhere and the beaches and terrain is similar to the California coast and surfing is king.

When we were speaking with my family about towns we want to visit to possibly live in Puerto Rico we mentioned Rincon and wow their reaction! They basically told us that we might as well move to Florida to be around "gringos" and palm trees. I didn't realize the concentrated amount of expats there. Being that we are Puerto Rican and want to immerse ourselves in our culture and around the native people we are knocking the "gringoland" towns off the places to consider living list. I definitely understand the appeal though for English-only speaking people wanting to live there seeing that must make the transition much smoother with less culture shock.

, miracle your family did not smack you one.
My family has been drilling into me for many years about moving back to PR and get angry when I fail to visit each of them. But I need to keep my handsome figure, If I visit 5 places that is 5 plates of food in one afternoon and like 20 plates if I visit all of them in a single day which is impossible as they are scattered around east and central PR.

I'm surprised too that I didn't get a chankleta to the head! My husband and I were definetly not expecting that strong of a reaction. We see their point though! Whenever we visit the island without visiting everyone we hear it, also. Especially now that I have two little ones which makes it all the more challenging to be mobile and deal with grumpy children off their routine.

They want to see you, the little ones and for you to embrace the culture. Maybe also for you to be close so they can always come and have their nose in your business.

ReyP wrote:

They want to see you, the little ones and for you to embrace the culture. Maybe also for you to be close so they can always come and have their nose in your business.

It's true everyone is excited to see all of us and have our children grow up in Puerto Rican in our native culture. I remember when it was common for families to all live on the same street. They're pushing it if they think that's going to happen though. Ja!

ravenmickey wrote:

ReyP wrote:

They want to see you, the little ones and for you to embrace the culture. Maybe also for you to be close so they can always come and have their nose in your business.

It's true everyone is excited to see all of us and have our children grow up in Puerto Rican in our native culture. I remember when it was common for families to all live on the same street. They're pushing it if they think that's going to happen though. Ja!

My sister in law family they all live in the same street, about 4 houses of the 10 houses are theirs.

"Pueblo pequeño, infierno grande".