Our Track Record
“But does it work? All your strategies and transaction structuring and networking and risk management – do they pay off for you and your investors?”
Answer: Yes. Not only does our method of predicting, investing in, and shaping the Latin American real estate market sound good, it’s been proven to work by our investing track record to date.
Here’s a sampling of track record with Latin American real estate investments:
Acquisition of 400-acre island now valued at 176% of initial investment
Here’s the thing about local knowledge in Panama: there’s what the locals know, then there’s understanding what that means from an investment standpoint, and then there’s what the international investment community knows. And in between the gaps is where opportunity lies.
Just ahead of a new road entering a promising area we sent our scouts into a region of Panama to search for property. The locals knew the road was coming, but didn’t connect that with an increased desirability of the property on the part of investors. But we understood exactly what a new road would do to appreciate the value of the surrounding property. So we sent out scouts out to find opportunity.
The area contained dozens of islands just off it’s coast, and our scouts were able to locate a 400 acre island that was completely uninhabited, covered in primary & secondary forest, with over 5 miles of coastline.
After spotting the island, we used our connections to “look Panamanian” and contacted the property owner through proxy. A property negotiation was set up wherein our local attorney (who has part ownership in our company) was able to negotiate the deal for 1/6th of the owners opening price.
In other words, we bought the property at such a low price, that even if the real estate market tanked, we could still sell for a profit.
And in fact, the market did turn south shortly after we bought (and we still could have sold for a small profit). But we held onto the property, the road came through just as we knew it would, and property values skyrocketed.
In addition we were able to add value to the property by reducing uncertainty and risk for potential buyers. We:
- completed a topography of the property,
- secured an environmental opinion,
- completed water studies,
- documented chain of ownership, and
- created trails throughout the property to provide access.
The property is currently on the market for USD $4.75M – representing an over 75% profit
Purchased a farm in 2008, subdivided and resold in 2009 at 143% net profits to investors
After scouting the availability of a small farm that had approximately 400 meters of coastline, we were able to complete the acquisition at incredibly favorable rates by traveling to the farm on horseback and negotiating the deal in Spanish directly with the land holder.
After acquisition we completed a topography of the property, secured an environmental opinion, completed water studies, documented chain of ownership, and created trails throughout the property to provide access.
The property was subdivided into 10 lots and sold using an internet campaign and local contacts in order to market the property directly to end consumers. Resulting profits were in excess of 143% for the investors.
Purchased 400 meters of coastline, sold 25% as fractional ownership surf camp for 50% profits
We were able to negotiate incredibly favorable rates on an X acre unimproved farm with 400 meters of coastline. A variety of factors and market conditions (Along with the US, Latin America was also experiencing hard times for real estate during much of 2008) made a direct resale of this land for development a still-profitable-but-unattractive option for us.
We needed to shape the market for the unimproved land, create profits for investors, and hold the bulk of property for sale during better market times.
So we turned the coastline property into a fractional ownership camp.
Sold 25% of our shares for that camp (during the worst market in years), and generated profits in excess of 50% for the investors.
Best of all, we’re still able to convert the remaining project into a small, 20 lot development, having already profited 50% from the initial acquisition. We will be partnering with the fractional owners, and carrying out the development in 2010.
Secured option to purchase oceanfront farm in 2008, purchased and resold in 2009
After numerous lengthy negotiations with a family who owned a 35 acre oceanfront farm, we were able to reach a joint venture agreement with the family to purchase and sell the property.
As part of the joint venture, we did all of the topo, water studies, etc necessary to make the 40 acres of oceanfront property salable. We purchased and resold the property in 2009, resulting in more than favorable (but confidential) ROI to the investors.