Finding Our Way

Six months ago, (Sep 29) we arrived in Mexico with seven pieces of luggage and a smile on our faces.  We could not believe that after such a long process, we were finally here.

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It’s funny really, that for most of our lives, neither of us ever even considered Mexico to be on our list of vacation destinations let alone a place we would move to.  But it was that first cruise we took in 2009, which stopped in Puerto Vallarta, Mazatlán and Cabo San Lucas that made us change our mind.  Since that cruise, we visited Los Cabos a total of ten times and over the years, we seriously started to consider the possibility of living here.  It became more than just a place to us; it started to become home.

And now here we are, six months in and totally no regrets!

Other than the fact that we are currently right in the middle of a major kitchen renovation (stay tuned – more on that to come) and most of our stuff is currently packed away in the guest room, we feel like we have totally settled into our new life now.  We have found our new routine; we are able to find the things we need, and we are able to sort out and deal with things as they come up. 

Here is a little of what we have learned and what we have been up to during the last six months…

Property Manager:  When we first bought the condo in Cabo, we hired a property manager (Patricia Property Management) to look after our place when we were not here.  After we moved, we decided to keep them on, as it was much easier for us to simply pay them and they would take care of paying all our bills.  We figured this would give us some time to eventually learn how to do it ourselves.  They are also available at a moment’s notice if we have an urgent issue with the condo, and as well, they have a huge network of trades people that they can refer, negotiate with, and hire for any job we need done (like our current kitchen reno).

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Residency:  It was important for us to get our residency sorted out as soon as possible because you cannot open a bank account or buy a car or a lot of other things until that happens. Lorne was able to “pre-qualify” for his Mexican residency before we left Canada and then once here, we worked with a local person (Josie from Mexico Paperworks) who specializes in helping people through this process.  Lorne received his residency card on Oct 29^th (a month after arriving).  For me, it was a bit more complicated as I have had 3 surnames (being married twice) and needed to obtain the complete paper trail to verify how I became who I am now.  Once I had everything, I was able to apply under the “familia” option and on Feb 26^th (almost 4 months after arriving) I finally received my residency.

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Home Office:   Lorne was not as lucky as I was to be able to retire at this point, so one of the first things we had to tackle once we arrived was to clear out one of the two guest rooms and turn it into an office for Lorne to be able to work.  We ordered office furniture and arranged the room so it would accommodate functioning workspaces for both of us.  We previously had the internet installed in this room, so he had a strong connection to remotely connect to his head office in New Zealand with no issues for working all day.  However, with the internet based in the office, the wifi signal was so weak throughout the rest of the condo.  This was mostly because it had to transmit through concrete walls from one end of the condo to the other.  We tried getting a “booster” which we installed in our bedroom (1/2 way through the condo) but still gave us a spotty signal when we were in the living room or on the patio.  Finally, after further research, we bought a mesh system with “Powerline Back-Haul” to overcome solid wall interference.  It has a base in the office, a booster in our room and a second booster in the living room.  Now we have a nice strong wifi signal throughout our whole place.

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Bank Account:    After Lorne received his residency, he was finally able to open a local bank account at BBVA, and once we had the bank account set up, we had to figure out how to move money from Canada to Cabo.  We previously had used a company called XE Transfer to transfer payments from Canada to the Mexico mortgage company and to our property manager, however, after we moved here and changed our address info, XE would not allow us to transfer anymore.  Even though the money was coming from our Canadian bank account, they also required the person transferring the money to have a Canadian address.  It took a few tries searching for another company and finally found Wise (formerly Transferwise).  So far so good, and we can once again transfer money from Canada to Cabo without issue.  And good thing too, as we have found that paying for most things here, other than buying basic groceries or eating in restaurants, requires payment by bank transfer.  This is how we had to pay for our car, pay for the kitchen reno, pay for a new stove, and even pay for some new furniture we bought.

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Buying a car:   Buying a car in Mexico was an interesting experience.  We knew that Lorne needed to have his residency to get a Mexico driver’s license, and he needed that driver’s license to complete the registration in order to buy the car.  He had the residency but getting the driver’s license took a little longer.  Due to COVID, there was a six week wait to get an appointment to get his new license.  When we arrived here, we had rented a car for two months to give us time to get all the puzzle pieces into place, however with the delay in getting the driver’s license appointment, we had to extend the rental a few more weeks.  While we were waiting, Lorne checked out all the car dealerships to find what was available (we did not want to wait longer to “bring something in”) and how the process works for payment, insurance etc.  When he got to the Kia dealership, he was advised that the new 2021 vehicles would be arriving the following week, so the following week, Lorne went back and found the vehicle for us.  He was quite happy to find out that the sticker price on the vehicle was the price you actually paid.  It was all in, taxes and everything, plus, there is no negotiating so you know upfront exactly what the vehicle will cost you.  He arranged for the bank transfer to pay for the car, and then on Dec 10^th, Lorne went in the morning to get his license, then had to bring the license to the dealership to complete the registration and then had to take the registration to buy insurance.  He then had to take the proof of insurance back to the dealership to finalize the sale.  After the sale was finalized, they needed a couple hours to get the car ready for us (to install our new roof rack) and later that night we drove up in our rental car (which we were so happy that the rental car company agreed to pick it up from us at the dealership) and picked up our brand-new Kia Seltos.  And it was a good thing we bought this car when we did, because within two weeks, all the brand new 2021 models were gone!

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Doctor visits:   Lorne’s first experience with the Mexico medical system was when he needed to get a “blood type” test which is required to get a driver’s license.  He contacted our local “fixer” (Josie at Mexico Paperworks, who has been invaluable with her vast amount of knowledge and assistance) and she directed Lorne to Blue Net Hospital.  He contacted them to see if he could make an appointment and found no appointment was necessary for this simple test.  He went the next day, paid approximately CAD$10.00, they drew his blood and by the afternoon he had the results in his email.  A couple months later, it was time to renew his diabetes medications.  He went back to Blue Net Hospital and made an appointment to see an endocrinologist, which was scheduled as quick as the next day. They did a complete blood workup, and the doctor wrote out the prescriptions he needed.  Cost for the specialist visit was CAD$50.00 and cost for the complete blood workup was $170.00.  Turned out, that was the easy part!  The more challenging part was actually finding the medications.  Blue Net has its own pharmacy but had only ½ the items he needed, and only a portion of the three months’ supply he wanted.  He had to visit several different pharmacies to pick up one box of this here and one box of that there.  This process was so different from Canada, where he would drop off his prescription and if they were missing stock, they would just order it in, and he would go back a few days later and pick up the complete order.  In the end he did manage to get everything he needed, but not the full three months’ supply that he wanted.  However, he now knows the process so will be ready to get the next batch when necessary.

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Shopping:  This has been a bit of an adventure for us.  For groceries, we tend to shop at a few different stores.  For the most part they carry similar things, but certain stores carry certain items you cannot find at the other stores.  And the most important lesson we learned – if you see a particular item that you might want/need down the road, you better buy it now because it may not be there next week (we had this issue with butter – now we keep extra on hand).  Sometimes they can restock the item within a couple of weeks, other times, it might take a few months.  So now, if we see something we have been waiting for, we grab it as soon as we see it.  For the most part, we can find most of the foods we are used to eating but now we have the bonus of being able to buy super fresh produce (bananas are so much more delicious here than the ones that are imported back home) and there is an abundance of fresh fish and seafood, which we are able to enjoy quite often now.  For dry goods shopping, Amazon Mexico has become our new best friend.  Since Cabo is mostly a tourist town, they do not have a lot of stores that sell things for your home.  There are a few furniture stores, but pricing is quite expensive, and selection is extremely limited.  There is a Walmart, but even Walmart has a limited selection as not many tourists are looking for kitchen storage containers or laundry hampers while they are here on vacation.  So, we have been shopping a lot on Amazon.com.mx for the additional things we need, and the delivery drivers are getting to know us so well.

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It has truly been an experience settling in here over the past six months. We have learned so much already and know that if we continue to stay open to new ideas, seize new opportunities and understand that everything evolves, our love for this place will continue to grow. We are so excited to see what our future holds.

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