We bought a condo in Puerto Vallarta and had never been there before…Are we crazy? Well to answer that question, yes, a little. It is true we had never been to Puerto Vallarta before. As I sit here in my little condo in Puerto Vallarta with the sun streaming into my living room, it’s hard to believe the journey that it took to get here. It seems so normal now when I walk down to the ocean, I stop and say Hola! to Mario, (the tour guy in our building) and our neighborhood taco stand couple, (it’s actually an SUV) and walk past the resort and onto the beach. But a few short years ago I wouldn’t have believed it. This is our life now. It doesn’t seem real. The moment I see the ocean and I smell the ocean air, and feel the breeze, I feel a flood of appreciation. I always take a little moment to give thanks. But all of this didn’t happen overnight. I had a dream of this moment for a long time though I didn’t know exactly what it would look like, how we would do it and I didn’t know all the things that would have to happen before it became reality.
Rewind about 8 years ago…we started to have dreams of traveling the world for a year after our trip to Croatia in 2016. We had said to each other how nice it would be if we could stay longer in the places we really liked. We experienced so many enjoyable places and wanted to linger so we could see more of these places. We were on a two-week tour, so the pace was a little rushed. There just wasn’t enough time. We had to get back to our jobs and chalked our musings up to a nice dream but not really reality. But little did we know that it planted a seed that started to grow quickly. Shortly it led to thoughts of what it would be like to move overseas as well. I had lived in several countries when I was growing up, so I was totally game to live somewhere other than the U.S. But I was surprised that George was so onboard with the idea as well.
As this idea evolved over the next couple years, we began to plot our escape. Escape from the 9-5 and escape from America. We had become unsatisfied with our jobs and wanted to just run away some days. When we asked ourselves what we really wanted, it was control over our financial destinies. Not that there is anything wrong with jobs, we had plenty of them over the years, but we wanted more freedom. We wanted freedom to move, travel, see, and just try things. If we changed our minds about a place, we wouldn’t have to get new jobs/lives just to explore a new place. I was looking into so many things that might give us the life we desired, Airbnb, selling my house and buying a place overseas that could be rented out for profit, the stock market, buying a trailer park, making a hipster campground, buying multiunit apartments to rent out, buying a laundry mat, selling t shirts on Shopify, digital products on Etsy, and KDP on Amazon. You name it, I was looking into it as a possibility. I just wanted that freedom so badly. I’m sure we’ve all been in a craptastic or stressful job and dreaded going into it. I would kiss George goodbye in the morning and wish we could just stay together and do our own thing instead.
So, we finally decided that we were just going to do it. Quit our jobs, sell our houses and travel around the world for a year. It was really happening! Just when we were ready to pull the chord on this great escape, we got the worst news ever. My Mom had terminal cancer. We decided to move in with her and be there for her and spend as much time as we could before…the inevitable. It didn’t even feel like a decision I consciously made, I just sat there on her hospital bed and knew I had to be there for her. We sold our houses, quit our jobs and drove up to Reno. The next couple years were some of the best while peppered with some of the worst moments I’ve ever experienced. There’s a lot more to being a caregiver for a parent than I realized. It’s very rewarding but also very stressful. I became her nurse, her estate planner, her cook, her confidant, her counselor, her housekeeper, her companion, and landscaper among other things. But I also laughed with her, cried with her, hugged her in those dark moments, and we talked our way through her departure from this earth. It was also one of the best decisions I’ve made in my life. We were able to have a couple more family holidays, birthdays, lots of hugs, tears, and laughs before Mom left us.
Covid hit a few months before Mom passed and it was just easy to hibernate at home for a long time, but we eventually turned our thoughts to travel again. We started to think about moving to Mexico or Spain. We narrowed it down to Puerto Vallarta through my research. There were a lot of factors why I chose it, some of which included, it’s by the ocean, it’s beautiful, English is widely spoken, large expat community, good infrastructure, modern shopping options, international airport, not too large or small, walkable and easy to get around without a car, etc. It was also easy to get home to Reno and we could fly to many other destinations around the world from it. Our thinking was to put the money from my mom’s house into a place to live and in an area that was more affordable than living in the States. That way we would have more money that we could devote to traveling.
Now the question was, how do we do this? George had a contract job that would be ending soon, my sister wanted me to buy me out of Mom’s house, and I was just working part time at cooking school, so I was ready to move on. The coordination and timing would be tricky. Now, I have been known to get analysis paralysis and delay making a decision and my sister knows this. I had been eyeing the real estate market for the last few years in Puerto Vallarta and had come across a condo that was in my price range about 400 ft from the beach and I was thinking about it but Annette knew I would need a push. She said, “Why don’t you just buy it? What’s the worst that could happen? If you don’t like it then you sell it or rent it out and come back. What’s the big deal?” Well I found myself unequipped to argue with such ironclad logic. So, between her and my new realtor saying we should put in an offer on it because we could always back out within 10 days, I booked a flight to Vallarta. 6 days later we hit the ground in Vallarta to look at the condo.
The condo looked like it did in the listing, and we started to envision our new life there. We spent the next few days exploring our new city and it continued to expose its beauty and unexpected treasures to us. It felt very alive, full of cars and people, friendly characters, delicious food, noises, nature, and cobblestone streets. We were super excited about the move now and it was becoming really REAL. When we got back to Reno we set about the task of “unburdening” ourselves of the things we had accumulated while spending 4 years in Reno and selling our cars. Of course, we had already done that when we left Phoenix as well. It’s amazing what you amass in a few short years. Within less than 2 months we would be in our new home in Mexico with only 4 suitcases of stuff to our name.
I won’t say that there weren’t a few hiccups in our “well laid” plans, but we did make it to Mexico, purchased a condo and settled in to making it our home. For one, the money for the condo went missing for a few days. I was like, “you better find my money or… I don’t know what I can ACTUALLY DO…!!!” And this was all while we were preparing to travel there and staying at a hotel. They wanted verifications from my bank and things I couldn’t access without going to a branch in the States and I’m like, “I’m in Mexico, you mo@$%@#$$#s!” I won’t lie, it was a stressful couple days before and after we got to Vallarta. Just before I was about to go HAM on these people, I got a call from the guy at my broker and said that the money had arrived in the escrow account. This was hours before the closing. Our realtor had mentioned something similar had happened to him during a transaction and alluded to the possibility that certain banks use that capital for the few days they have it and then it magically appears before closing. I couldn’t even be mad; I was just relieved that my money was found. Leave it to Mexico to make you feel alive!
As I write this, we are coming up on our 1st anniversary, and it’s hard to believe we’ve already been here a year! It flew by. It was filled with new adventures, friends, frustrations, and pleasant surprises. But we also had a couple hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, and crocodiles but hey, it wasn’t boring! So maybe we were a little crazy for just taking the leap and moving down here but I certainly don’t regret it. So the answer to the question, how long does it take for a dream to come true is…just enough time. I can’t wait to see what’s next!
