@Andrew Roque Would you switch and buy in CR and rent in US?

Mexico is the example I reach for because I have lived it. Some things are genuinely cheaper. Rent in a local neighborhood can run 65 to 75% less than what you paid at home. A bus ride is under a dollar. Healthcare, if you go local, costs a fraction of what it does in the US or Canada. You can pay lots out of pocket. But the surprises hit fast. Walmart Mexico is not Walmart USA. It functions as a mid-range grocery store. Imported brands and specialty products sit at prices close to what you left behind. A grocery budget built around local staples, fresh food from the tienda, rice, beans, produce from the market, can by quite affordable. The same budget built around familiar brands will costs significantly more. Same goes for your Amazon Orders ort for example, Airpod Pro 3 cost USD$334 in Mexico directly from the Apple Store while in the USA will USD$249 (34% difference) Car parts, clothing, anything ordered from abroad: add 15 to 20% for duties and currency. Expat-oriented neighborhoods and gated communities carry maintenance fees, security costs, and price premiums built for people who did not come here to save money. The savings are real. But they belong to the people willing to live closer to how locals live. That is a different kind of move than just changing your address.

@Andrew Roque is that because you are rural? Would you say it also applies to other cities/towns in Costa Rica?

Yesterday I was at a barbecue at my friend Ollie's place. He and his wife Wendy have an eight year old. Another guest had two teenagers. Her sister flew in from Canada with her teenage son. A new family just arrived in town with two kids under six. I was the only one without kids. Some of them had been coming/living in this town for a decade or more by now. What struck me is that every single one of these people, at some point, decided they wanted something different and went after it. That's what put us all in the same garden. The opinions were all over the place. The stories were different, yet kind of similar. Most of us arrived here with a set of beliefs that had already been challenged. And most of us are still in the process of rebuilding, figuring out what we actually think now, with this new life and these new people around us. That process does something to you. It makes you more open to ideas you wouldn't have considered before. More patient. Less quick to judge. More willing to accept people exactly as they are. Not because anyone decided to be that way. Because the life here asks it of you. That's a skill you pick up when you choose to live differently. And it quietly makes your world bigger.

@Janice Turoczi what a great opportunity for you to come back home and not have to explain to people how it is, but to be able to show them by the growth and the experience that you've been a part of.