#641 – The Expat Files Living in Latin America

Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.

[00:00] South of the border, down Mexico way That's where I fell in love when the stars above came up to play and now as I wander Hello there all you expat wannabes I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America The show that tells you just what it's like to live work play and or retire down here in Latin America It's a mix of the good the bad the ugly and the great and it's all right here So let's get started the theme of this program the expat files living in Latin America is really the good the bad the ugly and the Great as experienced by expats and gringos Which means depending on if you're a latin or a gringo The good the bad the ugly and the great could mean completely different things for example take that famous

[00:49] Mignana time thing for latins. That's great That means if you get an appointment at your lawyer's office or doctor Whatever you can be a half an hour an hour even two hours late, and they'll still take you with a smile But Mignana time for us gringos and expats is an endless Irritated that often puts us in a kind of a sour mood but you have to remember a thing like Mignana time is what contributes to the happiness syndrome down here in Latin America and the fact that people are so much less stressed and You'd think because so many people down here are poor and living on the edge If that's how the average person's life was going up in the first world. He'd be in a state of stress all the time So up there in st. Louis. Yes down here in Latin America No case in point just yesterday. I was visiting a single-family home construction site nice house

[01:39] What you'd call upper middle class here in Latin America middle class where you come from maybe 250 to 350 thousand in the? Minnesota burbs and down here in the Latin American burbs probably around 125 to 150 thousand if you have your own architect and contract it out yourself now This is in a gated guarded subdivision, and I was invited over by the owner He's a latin guy an engineer forty something years old And he wanted my opinion on a few things including a security system and believe it or not a drone get to that later Anyway, it's being built on a half-acre lot lots of trees and valleys and hills a pristine green healthy environment Most Americans would die for I'm guessing he paid 30 grand for the lot So he's building this new house, and it's for his brother, and it's right next door to his own house

[02:27] Yes, it's kind of typical most Latins live very close by to their relatives Whether you're talking about the richest or porous of neighborhoods in fact most houses have extended family live in their grandma grandpa The kids even married couples it's been a tradition in Latin societies forever Which is why there's absolutely no shame with a 35 or 40 year old son or daughter Living at home or even married couples living with mom and dad basically forever Anyway, this guy's got money in a huge beautiful garden in fact He has a full-time gardener So we're sitting down in a little gazebo in his garden looking over at the next lot where the construction is going on in fact It's a big concrete day. They're pouring a cement slab for a roof Remember good construction here in Latin America is anti seismic

[03:15] So there's a lot of concrete block and rebar therefore a lot of houses have concrete slab roofs And some people don't finish them off, so they're dead ugly of course Especially when they leave the piping and rebar sticking out because they intend to put another story on some day or another Which they almost never get to remember I spoke about that. I think it was in last week's show However educated upper middle class guys like this one have more taste than that Usually they always try to finish their houses off 100% So yes, this guy has some class or maybe it's his wife that has the class. That's how it usually works out, huh? He's having his brother's roof finished off like his roof with those nice classic Spanish terracotta tiles You know what I mean by the way. I asked the guy how much those things cost

[04:03] he said about a buck and a half a square foot and Installation maybe another buck a square foot, so let's say you got a 2,000 square foot house 1,000 square foot roof that would be around 2,500 bucks right meanwhile I just looked up the cost of putting down a shingle roof up in the States and guess what? They're saying the average labor costs for installing a shingle roof is 35 bucks an hour You heard me a shingle roof how classy huh meanwhile you pay your average builder down here 15 to 20 bucks a day Whether you're building a wall putting up shingles or terracotta and talking about shingles That's what 98% of American houses have who can afford a terracotta? Spanish tile roof up in the States only the mega wealthy right no

[04:52] And I'm not talking about those fiberglass prefab fake-looking terracotta clone roofs either You know the ones you see in those McMansion subdivisions all through the states I'm talking about the real thing down here in Latin America that'll last a couple hundred years for sure oh And by the way the best guarantee you're gonna get on a shingle roof up in the States is 20 years So right now if you want let's say a thousand square foot shingle roof up in the States It's gonna cost you around 2,500 bucks the same as a terracotta roof down here and that includes Materials and installation now the reason I mention this is because at almost every expat insider seminar I've ever given when we're doing the boots on the ground tour people see roofs like that The obvious question is how much and when I tell them they say sign me up

[05:38] I want one that is if they're gonna build which I don't recommend at first anyway remember I said rent always rent at least six months, but where were we oh? Yeah, I was sitting in the gazebo with my Latin engineer buddy by the way. He's a civil engineer Which is by the way way down the list of real engineers? That's what we used to say back in engineering school I remember back then civil engineers and those taking engineering management as a degree They really got no respect from electrical computer biomedical chemical and mechanical engineers Yeah, you know you can't get away from classism and elitism even in professional schools Or I should say especially in professional schools I mean, let's face it if you're in a medical specialty

[06:24] What specialties do you think get the least amount of respect from their peers in general veterinarians chiropractors? optometrists podiatrists dentists and Proctologists in that order by the way I got confirmation on that from a couple of doctors in my family But you knew that already right anyway I was sitting with this guy in his beautiful garden in that gazebo Watching the eight guys working on his brothers construction site next door And if you know anything about building a house or any kind of structure at all you know the concrete part of the work is the dirtiest filthiest hardest part of the job and Already an hour into the project these guys were Absolutely soaked and thoroughly matted with water sand Portland cement and moist chunks of this and that

[07:10] But here's the thing I wish I would have recorded the sounds and the voices of these guys While they were working if you were to close your eyes And you didn't know these guys were putting on a concrete roof and doing one of the dirtiest jobs imaginable You'd have thought they were on a beach playing sand volleyball or in a pool Screwing around and having a great old time these guys were laughing and singing and telling jokes I'm telling you you thought these guys were on vacation having the time of their lives and when I peek through the fence They didn't see me of course I could see these guys throwing little gobs of cement at each other laughing it up But always moving always working You know guy horseplay But yet they were really getting the job done and fast and when I asked my engineering buddy how much he paid these guys He said the guy in the red shirt the boss who was just as dirty and waterlogged as the rest

[07:59] He told me he paid that guy at 30 bucks a day and the other seven guys working for him. They're called Avaniels they all got around 15 bucks a day now We were talking about manana time before right and I asked my Latin buddy How far was his crew behind on that job? And he said all around two months and they had about four months to go to complete the thing by the way When you ask how far behind people are on anything? That's a legit question because that's almost always the case here all part of the manana time thing You know by the way if you recall the average house that is first-world style construction takes about a year to build down here And in the States about half that time hmm, so why is that well? You'll hear a lot of excuses, but none of them really hold up one of the excuses being well

[08:47] They're black and concrete that takes longer then there is that heavy rainy season about six months a year And you can't work outside during that time because you'll get drenched every day and the outside work will suffer too But you see with efficient proper planning none of that's a problem And you could get a house done in six months, but still it almost always takes a year the real reason is because Latins build houses and other projects in a traditional way an Inefficient way they know nothing of ergonomics practically everything they do is messy chaotic and disorganized bottom line They just don't think too far ahead for example I've never seen a single house or building under construction where some kind of substantial change structural Otherwise hasn't been done right in midstream

[09:33] I'm talking about fairly big changes to all the walls are up the roof is on all sudden the plumber comes in or the electrician And says hey this columns not supposed to be here Or you got to move that or you got to move the staircase a little bit remember all of this is in concrete Not would and that means as mo would say to the other stooges well fellas I guess we got a blast by the way big changes often happen at the end of a project to For example the owner or the owner's wife will do a walk-through when it's near completion and one of them will say uh-uh That archways got to be moved over or it's too small or it's too big or make the closet higher or lower or bigger Or smaller remember we're talking about blocking concrete and steel now So again fellas we got a blast unlike in the first world nothing down here is made exactly to print

[10:21] Architects and builders will tell you that all the time so unless you're living in a cookie cutter matchbox style subdivision We're all stinking houses are the same your own first world style what they'd call upper middle-class house down here We'll take a year to be built and here's one thing you certainly have to keep in mind almost all the guys Constructing your house except for maybe your general contractor architect informant We'll be living in middle and lower middle-class neighborhoods, so their own houses will have laminate roofs No, hot running water old beat-up furniture. That's falling apart smudged and stained walls That haven't been painted for years or even decades Maybe they won't even have glass panes in some of the windows and of course they'll be driveway chickens and the bathrooms Well, let's not talk about the bathrooms now These are the guys that'll be built in your house and putting in all those fine details

[11:09] First worlders like so much well just remember that old saying poor folks have poor habits That's the way it is so get used to the fact that when any phase of the job is completed or when they go For the night they will leave one big frickin mess when they're making and cutting wooden forms for concrete There'll be sawdust and bent nails everywhere some of that stuff might even end up on the neighbor's property look out when they paint something There'll be drips and drabs and tiny splashes everywhere in fact is I've never seen anyone who's painting Protect anything else with masking tape and that goes for drop cloths, too You'll probably have to show your maintenance guy how to use the both of them So do buy a few drop cloths and keep them around the house Sure hardware stores have masking tape down here, but almost no one uses it. Why do you think it's an extra expense?

[11:59] You'd be smart to have a few rolls of that in your junk drawer, too So be prepared they'll be splatters everywhere and look out if these guys are using tar that goes for thinner waterproofing shellac varnish stain or anything that needs to be applied with a brush or a roller oh and by the way Here's another thing that will certainly pissed you off you can count on the fact if you park your car anywhere near the Java site And there are a few workers around they'll lean on it touch it put their coffee cups down on it not to mention Spread the plans and drawings of the project out on your hood because you know the hood of your forerunner is a natural desktop Right oh, and here's another thing that'll piss you off if there's any kind of cement or mortar That's got to be mixed. It's rare They'll have one of those little cement mixes in to do it. They'll do it all by hand no problem there except It's very very messy without one of those things not to mention. They'll rarely use a mortar board

[12:50] You know what that is that would be a nice solid surface for them to mix this cement in the sand and the gravel and and Such so if they don't have one of those little cement mixers a good mortar board to use is a four by eight piece of plywood But like I said, it's rare that a contractor will use that instead They'll just go right out in the front of your house and start mixing right there Where's yet if you've got a port or asphalt driveway that'll become their preferred mixing spot because it's nice and flat and solid What happens when that's all over you got a nice big white cement spot a permanent stain? That's very obvious now latins don't seem to mind that but it really irks gringos And of course while they're mixing that stuff that wet cement or mortar mix will splatter everywhere so if there's a car or a building or a post or a tree anywhere within

[13:39] 20 or 30 feet of where they're mixing it it will get spattered and when they leave for the day It'll stay spattered unless you go out there and tell them to clean it up And if you don't that stuff will generally dry hard and you won't be able to get it off the next day Yep, that's just gonna happen. That's the way they do things down here. And like I said, Latins are used to it They don't mind that's why they call it the third world. So let me ask you this How are you gonna know to tell them that you'll know the next day after they've mixed some concrete in your driveway? Or you parked your car close to where they mixed or painted bottom line You'll save yourself a lot of grief if you hang around the first couple days and sit down some rules And you have to immediately stop the presses and alert everyone when their sloppiness gets out of hand No, I'm not saying that some of these guys don't do beautiful work, man

[14:27] I've never seen such good metal workers woodworkers cement contractors and plasters And they do it with so few modern tools Believe me contractors still come on the job with hand saws and hand drills You know the old brass and wooden ones with a knob on the end Your grandpa may have had one or you saw one on the antique home show or something doesn't matter These guys can get the work done and all of them have hand tools because they're used to working on Construction sites where for the first month or so they don't have any electricity. So it's Echo Amano all the way That's made by hand funny enough when you go to the average hardware store You'll always see a section with power drills and such But I've yet to see any small-time building contractor You know one who builds single-family homes who's in possession of a battery-powered drill or battery-powered anything

[15:17] Sure, the big outfits who advertise and have nice offices with 20 50 100 workers They have a few of those but your average contractor with less than 10 guys Well, they don't have any of that nor do they use Bobcats or backhoes to excavate foundations and footings for single-family homes Nope, that stuff is all done by hand and here's the logic Why rent a case 580 backhoe for a half a day for let's say a hundred bucks By the way in the States It's two to four times that when you could get five guys or so with picks and shovels Working and digging a whole day for what it cost to rent a backhoe for four hours The economics for the power equipment down here just doesn't work out compared to manual labor Not with single-family homes. It doesn't and by the way, I once asked that stupid question to a general contractor

[16:07] I said why don't you just rent a backhoe for a day get it all done and he stopped and looked at me like I was from another planet and said what and send my guys home and it was only some time later that I found out that most of these small crews of five eight or ten people are Family uncle Tullio's the boss. He's got three or four of his sons working for him And they got a couple of 15 and 16 year old cousins on the payroll, too They're not gonna lay off or cut the hours of their own family members to give someone else who's not family the work By the way, one of the sad things about the setup is the kids I'd come right out and ask these young kids why they aren't at school and they give the usual teenage kid answer It's because I don't like school. In fact, I hate it. I'd rather be working make some money

[16:52] Yeah, well, you can do that down here But up in the stage you can talk the talk but you can't walk the walk down here in Latin America It's not unusual for very young teenagers to drop out even nine and ten year olds You see that in a big market places and on the street all the time kids Obviously not even teenagers yet working alongside their parents who are usually in on it manning little kiosks selling things on the street Now, of course, everyone knows public schools are absolute crap But the kids will still learn how to read and write now It's not as if the media is not talking about this stuff Yeah, see it in the papers and on TV, but there's no real enforcement There are no chewing officers like there are up in the States and a good percentage of families are dirt poor So every member has to chip in even 10 and 12 year old kids sometimes

[17:40] Which is certainly why in some Latin countries the illiteracy rate it is 15 or 20 percent of the population In fact, I may have mentioned this before but expat Eddie's girlfriend's father. That would be Eddie's future sweat grow That's father-in-law. He's completely illiterate By the way, most of the maids and cleaning ladies coming from the boonies are illiterate, too So you better watch out when you write up a shopping list for them Which brings us back to the things you can do for your own help For example a friend of mine a gringo married to Latina Not only does he send his 40 something cleaning lady slash maid to school for language classes No, not English lessons. That would be Spanish lessons because when he hired her she was illiterate Well, not only that he pays for her two young kids to go to a private K through 12 school

[18:30] Nope, not one of those three or four hundred dollar a month private helicopter schools like the one he sends his kid to Nope, that'd be a little excessive. That'd be pushing it I guess I should explain something here There are something like three different levels of K through 12 private schools down here All of them infinitely better than those terrible public schools with the broken windows burnt out lights and the clogged and stanky plumbing so at the top you've got the helicopter schools from 300 to 500 dollars a month Where maybe half of the teachers are gringos or gringas from the states then they're either K through 12 private schools that are maybe a hundred To 200 bucks a month bilingual schools with high standards, but no first world gringo or gringo teachers Then there is what you might call the starter private K through 12 schools

[19:16] They run from maybe 40 to a hundred bucks a month They're not bilingual, but they offer a pretty good education in Spanish And that's where my gringle friend sends the children of his cleaning lady And he says they love it there because very very few indigenous people have a chance to send their kids To any place other than one of those horse Public school great idea Han if you have domestic help you can do it for their kids, too But where were we oh, yeah I started this rant today to try to give you an idea how real the Latin happiness factor is even when they're soaked to the guild Slinging concrete and mortar they really do seem happier than 99% of the gringos you meet and you know expat Eddie offers a simple Explanation for that by the way got some cool expat Eddie stories coming up in the future, so stay tuned

[20:04] He says he's noticed that even most gringos down on vacation are clock watchers And he says it seems as they get towards the halfway point on their vacation They start losing their joy the countdown to getting back on that plane and on that treadmill in Cleveland is never far from sight Man is he right and I've noticed that too hell I was that guy till I moved down here permanently by the way speaking of coming down I've got my July 2017 expat insider seminar sign-up sheet ready to go It'll be in and around Guatemala and 90% of the time will be way off the gringle tourist trail Exactly where you want to be to have the full effect of the gringo advantage You'll see so to get in on those early bird discounts Just go to www.thenewexpet.com then click on the seminar link on the main page

[20:53] And don't forget to add three or four extra days to your trip So you can take in one of those fabulous John Galt pre or post seminar trips and again I should mention if you come down to the seminar you can kill two birds with one stone that is apply for your permanent or temporary Residency in Guatemala at the very same time and you'll see all that explained in the seminar sign-up sheet, too Alright switching gears again You know once in a while. I recommend a movie or a documentary or book well I can tell you this I just saw a documentary that makes it into my top 10 of all time And the deep state is trying to censor this one, too. You just have to see this documentary. It's called zero That's zer o days zero days after you see that you're gonna want to put your plan beyond steroids

[21:40] I guarantee no more about that. I won't spoil it. Just see it zero days Alright, so at the beginning of the show I mentioned security cameras and drones I think everyone needs to have security cameras now whether you're up in big brother land or down here in Latin America And I mean good high-definition ones not the ones from Costco or Walmart And since I'm an engineer and engineers like gadgets maybe even almost as much as Latin women like shoes That's why I do have a way above average high-definition camera setup sure I know it's overkill, but you like what you like right now you can even get three four five eight and ten megapixel cameras for home use and Get this for a hundred to two hundred bucks a camera whereas way back when just a couple years ago

[22:25] For a three megapixel camera you're looking at over 500 bucks. So what about brand names? Well, I'll give you a hint. There is kind of a workhorse in the industry. It's called hick vision. H I K V-I-S-I-O-N Made in China, of course, but what isn't you can buy them on Amazon and they really deliver So then what about drones? That's a dirty word up in the states, right? And of course up there by you There are all kinds of restrictions when you buy a drone besides you have to register them get on the government list and pay a fee So then what about Latin America? What if you want a drone down here? Do they sell them? Of course they do the latest and greatest and newest models, too You see there's usually a hobby store or two and every upscale mall and that's where they'll sell drones

[23:11] However, they are about half again as much as what you'd pay for the same thing on Amazon Yeah, if you like gadgets like I do you want to have some of that stuff to play around with now I've mentioned down here in Latin America is why it open in a lot of respects kind of like the wild wild west However, there are those few gringoized first world states down here that are trying to regulate drones In fact over regulate them to the point of killing the sales of those things How about this amazing news coming out of that tainted gringoized country? You might have guessed it Costa Rica. Where else and I'll translate this comes from an article from a magazine called Central American Business Network title Drones in Costa Rica attacks on innovation It says the Costa Rican government will be affecting the activity of drones with bureaucratic costs of more than

[24:04] $3,500 for companies who want to use drones and why do companies want to use drones? Of course, that's to do topographic surveys and road construction mining tourism weddings events parades street fairs, etc In fact quite a few tourist marketing programs are done these days here in Latin America using drone photography It's either that or rent a helicopter for three to five hundred dollars an hour Some choice when a really good drone is only a couple thousand bucks and it's got a rock steady 4k or better camera Anyway, the article says when you're in the US There is an online registration process and more where companies and individuals pay from only five to fifty dollars However now in Costa Rica the directorate general of civil aviation

[24:52] Does not seem to be interested at all in the exploding market for aerial drone photography So as of now to receive certification to operate your drone, it will cost $1,875 plus $90 a year for a license Not only that you must carry proof that you purchased third-party insurance liability coverage estimated to be around 1,800 bucks a year and get this Owners will be required to take a drone safety course sanctioned by the Costa Rican government Yeah, like those maggot-brained slugs would be up on that kind of technology You got to wonder which congressman's brother-in-law is gonna be teaching that course and get this it says the Costa Rican inspector of aeronautical operations for civil aviation

[25:39] Alan Dikas said in a recent interview the original amount proposed by the government was three times higher and They did finally cave to pressure from the aeronautics and tourism agencies that use those drones However, it says George Umania president of the Association of pilots and operators Says the fees are so high that no one can really believe it and the general feeling is that we will just use our drones Clandestinely with some exceptions, which is not good for general aviation and safety issues But the government has once again interfered and made it impossible to do business as usual Then he finished the interview by saying the government will most likely annihilate the very industry. They're trying to regulate

[26:29] Meanwhile, it says under pressure the Costa Rican government has reduced the fee to around $1,500 but only for the next six month period after that the full fee will be phased in and lastly it says there are 15 formal enterprises in Costa Rica engaged in importing and marketing of drone products in addition There are around 25 informal companies that are bringing them in and selling them surprise surprise Mostly off the books. I wonder why hmm So to recap the Costa Rican Aviation Administration has put heavy regulations on the use of drones forcing operators to maintain strict flight records GPS mapping and to demonstrate they have a policy for damage against third parties Meanwhile in the rest of Latin America only simple registration for commercial users

[27:19] And as far as enforcement forget about it as for Costa Rica, that would be reason Six thousand seven hundred and twenty one why your plan B should never include that up country south of the border This is the expat files living in Latin America If you want me to help you out with your own plan B Just schedule a one-on-one consult send me an email the expat files at gmail.com And if you want to learn how to move forward with your own plan B from right up there in the states go to www.xpatplanb.com and check out my three videos. See ya nos vemos