The annual Millionaire Migration Report, published by data intelligence company New World Wealth with the help of global investment firm Henley & Partners, tops the Central American nation of Costa Rica as the country that attracts the most foreign millionaires in Latin America.
Traditionally known for its tourist-friendly climate, world-renowned coffee beans, tropical Pacific coasts, and remarkably stable government, Costa Rica is expected to welcome a total of around 350 of the world’s millionaires, more than any other nation in the region. The estimated wealth of these relocating families accounts for $2.8 billion, seconded by the neighboring Central American nation of Panama.
Recent reports issued by economists and analysts who specialize in the region forecast Costa Rica with higher rates of economic growth compared to other nations in the region. Costa Rica has also managed to avoid the distressing rates of inflation troubling some of her fellow American nation-states of late. Overall, economists are optimistic of Costa Rican prospects for economic growth and expansion, ultimately helping to shape investor confidence in the country.
Permanent relocations to Central America – to Costa Rica, Panama, El Salvador, and even further south to Colombia and Ecuador intensified during the COVID-19 pandemic, when individual family units were afforded the opportunities to suddenly make transitions to work from home by their employers. To trade in the exorbitant costs of living in more developed countries like the United States and Western Europe, for the comfortable lifestyles and more modest costs, so popular among traveling tourists, foreigners from other parts of the world decided to relocate altogether in countries south of the U.S.-Mexico border.
However, a concerning crime wave is taking Costa Rica by storm as the current President Rodrigo Chaves looks to apply pressure on these criminal elements by taking a more “Bukele-like” approach to law and order. Such efforts have received great praise from more conservative-leaning political leaders in the region, who believe that the plague of drug-infested criminal gangs and organizations controlling large parts of Latin America should be eradicated once and for all.
Thefts and armed robberies are now at an alarming rate, especially in the Costa Rican capital of San José, where an increasing number of targets are unwitting traveling tourists. Robberies remain a persistent issue in San José, with the Judicial Investigation Agency (OIJ) reporting over 5,000 cases annually in 2022 and 2023, a trend that extended into 2024, according to the Tico Times, a local Costa Rican news outlet. A recent poll revealed that over 60% of residents in Costa Rica view the issue of crime and security as their main concern.
The rise in crime is attributed to warring armed factions of criminal gangs contending over lucrative drug routes in the region. Influence from other regional drug organizations like the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico, and the Gulf Clan in the northern regions of Colombia, funding armed gangs and their operations along the Isthmus in places like Costa Rica, a key corridor to the region’s drug trade.
Although most of the petty thefts and aggravated robberies of tourists and other local Costa Ricans are not correlated with the drug-fueled gang wars, but are often carried out by small-time bandits and thieves who prey on distracted foreigners from Canada, the United States, and Europe.
However, by all measures, these local plights don’t appear to be interrupting the desire for the world’s wealthiest to relocate to the region. By and large, the people of Central America, and the more developed country of Costa Rica, are welcoming and very desirable destinations, with countless attractions and local destinations to frequent, especially when coming down with treasure chests of gold.
