WHAT is paradise? For me, paradise on earth is just a state of mind. It is always a bias based on which country you have been born and raised. If you were raised in Madrid, paradise for you might mean seeing the miles and miles of coastline by cruceros in the Mediterranean provinces such as in the Andalucian community. But even in the urban confines that is Madrid, there can be paradise in itself. If you are just creative enough to decorate your own condominium unit and lease it to other persons, then surely you can have a booming business. You don’t need to hire a professional interior designer and decorator to do that, that’s just a waste of money. Just be imaginative. To attract prospective buyers in your new, rather refurbished, condo unit in the middle of Madrid, you place lots of lampshades in strategic corners of the room. This will make the interior beautiful. Then have the cover of the lampshades change to either pink, green or blue so there will be a blend of colors in your interior environment and it will be smooth to the eyes. Do away with the rest of the incandescent and flourescent lamps; they will just be a waste of energy and an increase in electric bills. Only encourage the use of table lamps when you need to read or write something on your working desk.

To illuminate your living room at night, have some imagination again. You may want to install in some sort of projection of a nebula or a constellation to illuminate your ceiling. And you can also attach from the ceiling a model airplane. This can really a fascinate the child in an adult vacationer. And above all, focus on the practical uses of a condominum unit. Have your whole house wired and set for an alarm security system. This may take some investment but you can easily recoup your capital once there are lots of vacationers who have booked your condo units for the next few months or so. And then be practical. You don’t need a new heater or a new air conditioner to go with your new vacation home. All you need to have is your existing appliances. If all they need are paint jobs, then settle for that. In the urban areas, though you need lots of telecommunications utilities. You have to have a wired and wireless Internet connection in your own home. You also have to have cable television.

But if you’re staying close to the Mediterranean, then there are other alternatives that you can invest on. For example, if you’re staying in Costa del Sol, then you can always buy a piece of land near a nudist beach and erect (no pun intended) a vacation home there. Then be very creative in the design of your home. Have it sport an all-wooden interior to have that tropical feel because Mediterranean is nothing but fresh seafood and beautiful sea waves. Or if you’re in such a place as the Pyrenees, now is a great opportune time to have a real estate investment there. There are lots of wintry vacationers in these aresa during the Christmas season and beyond. Even during summer, places like the Pyrenees, the Alps and even Lake Tahoe in California are real estate havens as far as investors are concerned.

Or maybe you want to invest in a tropical country like the Philippines. There are also lots of upper middle-class families right now in that country who have chosen to move into new and more trendy and upscale locations. I can cite to you one place - Century City. When I went there a couple of weeks back, construction of the new Century City is currently in full bloom. If you purchase there a unit or two and lease or even sell it to your countrymen, then you can surely recoup the price. But go beyond Manila. Even in other urban areas in the country such as Cebu, Cagayan de Oro and Davao, real estate investments have never been this good. There are numerous subdivisions on the rise such as those erected by Ayala Land, Filinvest and A. Brown. Real estate boom here is akin to what is currently a fact in places such as Taiwan, Dubai and even Shanghai.

WHEREVER country you are in the world, if you are a foreigner, the first option to do when going property hunting is to know the real estate policy in that country by heart. Real estate sales may not only mean individual foreign ownership but there are also other categories such as buying a property for commercial or industrial or agricultural use. And taxes for these properties are certainly higher because the estate is used for profit purposes.
For example, even if you own a business and you don’t have other stockholders with you, once you’ve bought property in a foreign country and that specificity is cultivated for agricultural purposes say for instance a farm, taxes for that property will definitely be higher than if you just use the property as a holiday retreat. Another thing to look out for is whether your personal business has its own distinct juridical personality. That means that if the property bought is charged to your company’s name, you don’t have any personal liability to it. All taxes are charged to your company’s name.
One other thing to look out for is corporate ownership. Even if you are the major stockholder of a certain company but if you have other owners joining you, then the property bought in a foreign country to be used as a factory perhaps will again not be charged to your name but to the company’s name as a whole. Almost every country on earth nowadays is charging only minimal taxes for foreign investors and even foreign tourists because they want to show goodwill to these individuals.
Even the housing mortgage slump in the United States is slowly diminishing as many investors are in the process of recovering their funds with the coming winter in the United States. In winter, expect tourist arrivals to jump as Lake Tahoe somewhere in the Nevada-California border becomes the premier tourist destination. These tourists ultimately stay in vacation homes with a spectacular view of the lake. Lake Tahoe is a prime tourist destination known for its wintry sports such as ice skiing, mountain hiking, biking, horse riding and even dog sled races. It was even the host of a previous Winter Olympics. That’s why both foreign and domestic tourists flock here during winter. Some of them who do not endure physical activities simply unwind for a game of golf and baccarat here. There are numerous casinos are splashed in this lakeside 22 miles long. In the meantime, golf courses here abound with instructors and caddies all PGA-certified. Some simply want to tour around the lake aboard luxury yachts, disembark and fish at its numerous tributaries.
They not only stay here but they also ultimately find time to scout properties here. Thus, numerous developments around Lake Tahoe are now sprouting. If you remember the Sandra Bullock/Keanu Reeves The Lake House and recall the stunning view of the cabin that the couple are living in, that’s how beautiful properties here in Lake Tahoe are. So come now in the United States and scout for hot property offers.