Mexico’s Pacific coast beckons retirees

CHACALA, Mexico — Retired U.S. soccer executive Gordon Preston has no regrets about retiring to Mexico.

Standing on his third-floor patio, overlooking the turquoise blue Pacific Ocean, coconut palms swaying in the gentle breeze, he sipped his Pacifico beer, chuckled and shook his head.

“No, I can’t think of a single downside,” said Mr. Preston, surveying the comfortable three-bedroom, three-bath home he had built and furnished for less than $100,000. “I feel at home here like nowhere else.”

Mr. Preston is a retired Detroit executive with the now-defunct North American Soccer League who helped bring the World Cup to the United States in 1994. He first visited Mexico on soccer business 17 years ago and then started spending winters in Chacala, 60 miles north of Puerto Vallarta.

He and his wife, Nancy Lehocky, are two of the estimated 1 million Americans and Canadians living in Mexico at any given time.

Mexico’s laws were revamped in 1994 to make it easier for foreigners to invest in Mexican real estate and buy second homes, creating a building boom as “gringos” from the north flock to the white sand beaches of the south.

Although foreigners still have to negotiate some legal hurdles, the population along the coast is growing — swelling exponentially after Christmas, when harsh winds, cold and snow rake El Norte and “snowbirds ” from Canada and the United States head south for the winter, to bask on the beaches and sip margaritas in the near-perfect weather — sunny 80-degree days with no humidity and 60-degree nights — that bless coastal Mexico in winter.

Building boom

Like the campers currently parked on the beach, Mr. Preston started out in a tricked-out recreational vehicle. And like many U.S. retirees south of the border, Mr. Preston maintains a “summer” home in the United States. But seven years ago, he bought a piece of prime real estate on the hill overlooking the small fishing village and its two scenic bays. He started building three years ago.

“We drive down before Thanksgiving and go back in April or May. But I may spend the summer here this year,” he said. “Hopefully, my kids and grandkids will get this someday.”

Many second-home settlers first visited for a resort vacation, returned for longer stays in recreational vehicles and then started buying.

“My biggest mistake when I came here 11 years ago was not buying everything I could. If I won a million dollars today, I’d invest it all right here,” said Harvey Craig, a fast-talking, retired Canadian tool-and-die maker, reborn as a real estate broker and developer in Sayulita, a booming surfing village between Chacala and Puerto Vallarta.

“I don’t know anyone who ever bought property here who didn’t make money. … Moving here was absolutely the best decision I ever made in my life.”

As a result of Mexico’s legal changes that protect foreign investment, the sheer volume and intensity of major and minor construction on the coast, especially along “Costa Vallarta” — the 100 miles of coastal villages north of Puerto Vallarta to San Blas — is difficult to fathom.

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