Guest Post by Marina Villatoro

Hi everyone, I’d like to introduce myself before I get into my juicy story:) But first, I’d like to say a huge thanks to Mark for inviting me to guest post. The first post I read by Mark was when he said that he took his wife out for an ice cream without the kids to avoid going to therapy. I immediately connected with him and this was before I found out he has house full of kids while I only have 1! If an outing for an ice cream can avoid therapy for them, for me it would be like a full on honeymoon:)

Plus, he’s a traditional practicing Catholic from Phoenix, Arizona land of sun and fun, while I’m a secular Russian Jew from New York City! Do you think we experience Semana Santa equally?

I actually started reading Mark’s blog while still living in Costa Rica where I’ve been an expat for the past 6.5 years. It was part of my due diligence for my move to Guatemala. I finally moved to Antigua about 5 weeks ago.

My quick background and why I’m here. I met my husband eight years ago while camping next to him in Tikal. He was the very first Guatemalan I ever met in my life and now I have a son that’s half Guatemalan. After getting married we moved to Costa Rica for him to get his Masters Degree. Since we’re not Ticos he couldn’t secure a job, so we moved to Guatemala!

My move wasn’t spontaneous, which would have been the case if I didn’t have a little boy to keep happy. That’s how I winged it in Costa Rica, and trust me even though it sounds romantic and all, it wasn’t easy! So this time we came prepared.

Few rules were laid out by me before moving here:

1. I don’t want to live anywhere near Guatemala City
2. I want to live in dead center Antigua
3. I want to be so close to everything that I can either walk it or take a scooter

With these simple yet etched-in-stone points, we set out to structure my move here.

First and foremost we needed a house. I am the type to do everything to the extreme. So I called every single real estate agent in the area. Quick FYI, there are very few listings for rentals by owners. And if there is one, they are overpriced because they are geared towards foreigners. So, I made appointments with every single agent there is. Century 21, Casa Nova has by far the most listings. And we started on our trek.

The very first house we saw, we fell in love! But it was way out of our price range. However, my agent reassured me that they would go down in price quite rapidly if it’s for a long term contract. No way did we believe they would go that low, but we went along with it. So holding our breath, but also having plan B in total swing, we continued with the rest of the agents. All of them showed us crap! Over priced, a good 10 minute drive from Antigua center and smelly! Disheartened, I was sure we would get nothing that we were looking for.

Finally, our agent called us and confirmed the house for 35% less than the going rate. Yeah I know – too good to be true? We were like, what is wrong with the place? Why did they go down so fast? Why was it vacated for so long? But, you know when you just fall in love with a place, you overlook all the doubts and concerns. So we signed a year contract, left a deposit and first month and prayed that it wouldn’t have gargantuan leaks, the toilets will flush and rats won’t keep us awake all night. Another little FYI, Guatemala is the only country that I have lived in where the renter has to pay the lawyer fee for the contract.

Next line of business, finding a god school for my son!

Bio

Marina has been living in Central America for over 7 years and her site Travel Experta is all about traveling in Central America. Marina loves to help people plan the perfect vacation to this amazing part of the world! Join the fun on her facebook fan page and follow her on Twitter at @MarinaVillatoro.