Not since a Toronto cab driver offered me and my friend Greg twelve acres of vacant land in Ghana, Africa for $6,000 U.S. have I found such a deal on international real estate!

Since it’s my last day in Mexico, today’s listing of the day is a quaint 3-bedroom house in Ajijic, Mexico.

Un que reparto! Lanzaron en todo pero el fregadero de la cocina!

What does $350,000 buy you in Toronto these days?

Algunos pares de zapatos y de la lata de a de Coca-Cola?

Yeah, we’ve almost got to that point.

It used to be a simple rule of thumb that a 2-bedroom, 2-bathroom condo and the $300,000 threshold went hand and hand. But I’ve seen spacious 1-bedroom condos in newer buildings pushing the $300,000 mark, and it’s becoming increasingly common to see 2-bedroom, 2-bathroom units pushing the half-million mark for over 1200 sqft.

I’ve been touring some of the Ajijic real estate the last two days, and it’s unbelievable what $359,900 will get you.

The photo above is La Casa de Ensueno at 310 Paseo del Prado, Upper La Floresta.

Yep. I know EXACTLY where that is! I don’t need directions…

This house is in a gated community not too far from the city centre, and is actually one of the smaller homes in the neighborhood. While driving down the main road at the top of Ajijic—the only paved road in the city, the one that leads to Guadalajara, you take a right turn and head south towards the lake, but not before stopping at security.

Two guards stand at the main gate, which is the only opening in the 14-foot stone walls that surround the neighborhood, and record your licence plate, ask your name, and require your signature to enter.

Once inside, the cobblestone roads and tree-lined streets give the neighborhood that feeling of security that residents of a gated community pay so much for.

Houses are spread over beautiful estates, much larger and wide open than the small villas in the village of Ajijic. Everywhere you look, you see greenery, from the lush lawns to the palm trees to the majestic gardens and unbelievable landscaping that EVERY house has.

From the top of the street, you can see Lake Chapala at the base.

310 Paseo del Prado is a modest 3-bedroom, 3-bathroom house on a half-acre property. It’s not what’s inside the house that should impress but rather what’s outside.

The interior is of modest design, and perhaps doesn’t have the same “wow factor” that many do throughout Ajijic, but for $359,900, you aren’t getting limestone floors, walls, and toilets.

The backyard is simply stunning, with a garden that runs over 100 feet from the house to the back of the property. There is an outdoor pool and jacuzzi (standard feature in Mexico), and a small bodega containing the laundry facilities, as well as every garden tool known to man, which are all being sold with the house. That’s right: John Deere rider-mowers, shovels, hedgeclippers, and the like. Not that you’d be doing any gardening yourself! You PAY people to do that…

Fully mature fruit trees are perhaps the most unique feature of this backyard paradise. Banana, avocado, tangerine, lemon, & lime trees yield enough product to sell at the local market, if one were so inclined, or simply provide for a lifetime of drinking Corona’s and using a different slice of lime every time.

I think we tried to grow carrots in our backyard garden when I was a kid. I kept pulling them out of the soil prematurely to see what they looked like and how big they were. I put them back, thinking nobody would ever know, as I was completely unaware that once picked they refused to continue growing. My point to all this? If I grew up on this property in Ajijic, I wonder how much scotch tape I would use trying to stick all the avocado’s back up on the tree once I’d picked them….

The kitchen is fully updated by our standards, with all major appliances (sorry, no stainless steel), and every piece of cutlery, china, and kitchen gadget is being thrown in as well!

Actually, ALL the furniture goes with the house too! Beds, couches, tables, chairs, and a foosball table as well! I’m horrible at foosball. When everybody was playing foosball for years during university, I was delivering food to senior citizens…

The house is wired for high speed internet, and I can attest to the fact that TelMex is better than several of the telephone and internet providers we have back home.

All this for “only” $359,900 U.S. I’m absolutely flabbergasted. This is not some dirty, poor town in Mexcio that you see on TV. This city is authentic Mexico, where the quality of everything around you is top-notch, but the prices continue to amaze. From the restaurants and bars, to the bodegas, to the jazz bands—you can’t wrap your head around how affordable everything is and how the quality actually EXCEEDS many of your experiences back home.

And you can live in a private, gated community in a dreamhome for what an average 2-bedroom condo in downtown Toronto costs.

The only problem I foresee: how much time can you afford to spend down here in this 27-degree paradise each and every year? You have to work hard to afford it, but you work so hard and have so little time to enjoy it. It’s a vicious circle!

But I’ve met people in their mid-thirties that live down here 365 days a year.

They all lay the same claim: they bought property to vacation here, and the two weeks became a month, the month became six weeks, and then the six weeks became three months. Eventually, they moved here full time.

At breakfast this morning, I was offered a job with a local real estate company here in Ajijic.

I told them I wasn’t ready to make the move down here….

…..yet….

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