We Built a Casa in Mexico!

The last few years have been full of adventures, changes, successes, failures, and – probably more than anything else – challenges. If you’ve been following along, you know we took a yearlong sabbatical to travel the world, and then decided to make it a semi-permanent-batical (sure, that’s a word!), and scrap the traditional lives we had originally planned to return to. We opted instead to uproot our lives from Atlanta and plant them on the Pacific coast of Mexico on a blank slate of a (steep) hillside lot in San Pancho, Nayarit.

A year and a half ago, we moved to our new town, closed on the land, and immidiately and frantically started moving ahead with the construction process for our new home. Logistically, that involved finding an architect/builder (with which our real estate company graciously assisted us), sketching and resketching every possible option we could think of to create the home we envisioned (Room Sketcher was a great free resource), setting up new bank accounts and moving money from the US to Mexico (tip: use Transferwise.com instead of a bank wire transfer), obtaining permits (in which we used honest plans and apparently paid more than lots of other people who use fake scaled-back plans), attempting to communicate with our hired team in bad Spanish, and several more steps that we’ve at least temporarily blocked out as a coping mechanism.

This is not a how-to post, and even though we’re generally pretty organized people, the whole process was such a whirlwind that I think we’re still slightly reeling from it, and it will take some space and time to even process the whole experience. That aside, we had our heads down and were working so hard the whole time, that we didn’t share much of the process as it was happening and want to give a bit of an overview now.

THE START

We were gung-ho to get moving as quickly as possible, mainly for financial reasons. The costs of materials are always rising, and, even though I could still work remotely, Josh had very few money-making opportunities once we moved here. We knew from the start we’d be building rental units into the construction plan, and our hope was to have them completed in time for the start of the high season in November. We broke ground at the beginning of Februrary, and our contractor was confident we’d finish the project in October. And on budget. Great, excellent, let’s do this!

THE MIDDLE

The structures went up fast. Even though there were a few snafus, we were making good time, and spending around what we expected. We felt good and confident and excited. And then around six months in, we realized that things had slowed down way too much. As in there was absolutely no way we were finishing in October. Or on budget. We started talking to some other people who were also in the process of construction or who had been through it here before. When we told them, mopey and disheartened, that our project was running behind and over budget, they laughed, and said, of course it was. They had never heard of anyone here who had ever finished on time or on budget. Even though it sucked, and we realized our “budget” should have been at least 25% lower than the amount of money we actually had available, it made us feel just a tiny bit better to know we were in good company in a financially-sinking ship.

Overall the process was a big rollercoaster of excitement and disappointment. Even other than the schedule and the cash, the physical construction had its own ups and downs. Things were looking so good, and then all of the sudden, something super random was there that shouldn’t be, or was in the wrong place, or wasn’t centered. Then they’d have to demo and fix, and maybe they’d get it right that time. Or they’d say they’d fix it and then not, but have done the next stage so it couldn’t be easily repaired anymore. Even when Josh was spending 90% of the day on site, it was impossible for him to catch everything. So there were a LOT of frustrations. We fairly quickly got to the point where we had to weigh every situation and decide if it was worth the time and money and stress to fix it, or could we just live with it. We now have one shower with a whole bunch of weird extra niches and corners, but hey, it’s all part of the character, right?

The majority of the guys that worked on our crew were amazing. Genuinely nice, hardworking men who were really skilled. The vendors were a mixed bag. Our carpenter (notoriously the most difficult type of vendor with which to work) was a gem – on-time, good prices, and beautiful work. Our metal worker, on the other hand, had us screaming into our pillows. He was so incredibly late in delivering his sub-par work, that we ultimately wound up firing him and losing some of the money we had fronted him just so we could keep the project moving forward. Our plumber/electrician (they’re the same person here) was amazing. The glass guy regularly showed up three hours late or just not at all. Same with the painters and various other vendors. Here’s a sampling of excuses we got from vendors who couldn’t make it: it’s raining; my diabetes is bothering me; my wife is sick; my son is sick; my truck isn’t working; I hurt my hand; I hurt my foot; your other workers were late, so I couldn’t do what I needed to do, and I had to take other jobs; I cut my toe and had to go to the hospital; there’s a parade today, so the store is closed, and I can’t buy the supplies. I could go on.

I’m incredibly thankful that we were going through the construction process at the same time as some other great friends here (one of whom is writing a book about it!). As a group, it was so amazing to vent to each other, share resources, brainstorm, get feedback, and just generally support and cheer each other on. And it reinforced one of the reasons we chose San Pancho – the community. Even in this small and specific experience, we found a welcoming group here for that.

THE OUTCOME

Spoiler – we finished the project! I mean, it was never not going to happen, but at times, it felt a little like it. Ultimately, we wrapped everything up at the very beginning of January, about 3 months behind schedule, and unfortunately, about 35% over budget. We are super lucky to have had family that was willing to lend us money when the finances got tight and that believed in us no matter what throughout the process.

We moved into our house in October, and even though we were essentially living in the middle of a construction zone, it immediately felt like home. Josh pointed out that we had invested ourselves so much into the design and building process, that actually standing inside it felt instantly comfortable and familiar, just like another iteration or step in the planning.

About 2 weeks after construction was completed, we had our Airbnb listings live and welcomed our first guests. Halfway through high season, but still high season! So far, we’ve really enjoyed hosting people from all over and seeing them experience and enjoy what we built. One guest even told us it was the best Airbnb they had ever stayed in, which – wow, just wow. We’re going to bask in that one for a while.

Overall, we’re incredibly grateful we got to see this vision to fruition, but I’m not sure we’d be the first to raise our hands to go through the construction process again.