Moving to Playa del Carmen, Mexico

Apart from weather this is our NUMBER ONE question we receive in e-mails. How do you actually move and live in Playa del Carmen? People are always wanting to know how to make the move, take the plunge, live in paradise, and most of all move here to Playa del Carmen. There are many things to consider prior to moving to a foreign country, specifically Mexico, some of which my husband and I considered prior to our move here over 5 years ago, and others that didn't even cross our mind. I certainly do not want to discourage anyone from living their dream, but I am going to be honest in the fact that it IS NOT ALWAYS EASY!

Things to Consider:

Come for an extended visit-
Prior to actually moving here I always tell people to come down and scope things out as many times as they can before actually coming to live here full time. If your lifestyle and job permits, come down for a couple of months. This will allow you to take your time and check out different areas where you might want to live, if you want to start your own business see if that business is already here, check out the schools if you plan to move with children, and see if this area really is a fit for you. I have helped a couple of different families, via e-mail, that actually decided on not making the move; 1 family did the research ahead of time, whereas the other one did not, and moved here and ended up leaving fairly quickly. Below the surface of our beautiful Caribbean beaches, our incredible weather, and the laid back Mexican lifestyle, you still have to go to work, pay your bills, help your children acclimate away from their familiar daily routines, learn a new language, deal with all of the in's and out's of immigration, and in general, adapt to the idiosyncratic way of living in a foreign country. So I can not stress enough the importance of research and experiencing things locally for yourself prior to living here full time.

Children-
As a trained Montessori Teacher I know that children thrive on routine. They like the predictable, and often get very stressed when their routine is disrupted. Pre-teens, and teenagers are also a very moody bunch who often spend more time with friends then family, and their friends are their LIFE. I personally have seen more successful moves to Playa del Carmen with families that choose to move with younger children rather then with their pre-teens and teenagers.

The number one thing, which is not necessarily being away from friends, but adapting to a new language!This rings true especially for children moving here from the United States as the US is one of the ONLY nations that does not have a second language! Unfortunately our brains are not "trained" to adapt to new languages as easily as people who were brought up in bi-lingual homes or schools. Small children are like sponges and pick things up easily, and I have first hand knowledge of this when I taught here for the first couple of years that we were here. I had 1 four year old little boy in my class, originally from Italy, and he was learning his 5th language! And here I was thinking I was all that with 1 and 3/4 of a language. Needless to say the smaller ones definitely adapt more easily to the language hurdle, and all of the schools here either teach solely in Spanish or are bi-lingual programs where the day is split in half; teaching half the day in English, and half the day in Spanish. If you are planning ahead enroll your children in some beginning Spanish classes prior to moving, and this can help with the transition immensely!!

Selling your house-
If you are a homeowner, and it is financially feasible to keep your house, I would say hold onto it! Even if you decide to stay in Playa del Carmen, or try another part of Mexico, if you can hang onto your home for the first year I would recommend it. This not only gives you the option of moving back to your home town and country, but it also opens up more doors if you decide to buy down here in terms of mortgages and credit ratings.

Driving versus flying down when moving-
We chose to drive down here from our home town of Seattle, Washington, and not only was it fun, but it was practical! We were able to bring along our most prized possessions, as well as our existing family members; our 2 Australian Sheppard's, and our old cranky kitty. In addition to the extended road trip, we also arrived with our own set of wheels, although not required when living here, but much appreciated!

Pets-
Moving with pets was simple for us. All we needed were updated health certificates, which they barely glanced at at the border, and volila, we have our beloved furry friends here with us. When flying down with your pets there are more restrictions for ex: time of year versus temperature, layovers, fees, and limited space per flight for pets. There are also plenty of local veterinarians that practice locally and have comparable care to other parts of the world.

Health care-
We are lucky that there are actually some really great hospitals and doctors here in Playa del Carmen as well as a plethora of alternative health care professionals. But if you have specific health issues be sure to research prior to your arrival if you require a certain kind of specialist. This also rings true if you are taking daily medications; I was taking a prescribed medication when I first arrived, and I found out that they did NOT have the exact one available here upon my arrival. I was able to find an alternative, but keep this in mind when planning your move.

Dear Editor

Thank you so much for your tips. I am typically in the configuration that you described. I went to Playa 5 months ago with my wife only and just like many visitors, we fell in love with the place and considered a long term stay over there with our 2 kids (who are respectively 1 and 4 years old). Our plan is to stay 22 months in Playa dela carmen next year, and find out what the potential opportunities to set up a business are. I don't believe that we can easily rely on local jobs to maintain our current standard of living and because of the comepetition from the locals. The issue we have with the idea of setting up a business is that I believe that businesses like Hotel, bars, tourist tours are pretty numerous at this moment. Teh real estate busines is most probably going donw like anywhere else after the subprime crisis that hit the US. So we basically need to find out new business ideas in the area of providing services to companies. But I have no clue right now what direction we have to look at to be honest. By the way we are French, and heard that the French community is getting bigger and bigger over there, so this may give us a chance to investigate further.

Hi,
Ahh, yes everyone wants to live in Paradise! Playa del Carmen is an amazing place, but there is obviously alot to consider in order to move here. In terms of deciding what business to start here I can not really tell you. I don't know what your background is, what your resources are, what your education is, what languages you speak so I can't really say; "Oh you should start a ......" I suggest to people to come here with enough income to not work for 6-12 months and see what niches you feel need to be filled, and then you can go forth with opening a business that suits both you, your background, your family, and the business community here in Playa. I hope this helps!

If you would please explain the FM 3 visa to me. I am worn out from going back and forth to the mexican consulate in Houston, TX. They tell you something different each time,get this get that and I do just as they say but they always tell me I need something else! Frustrated is beyond words right now. The police report they request is from which police? I have a notorized clearance both from my town that I live in and the also the county. Do you know what police they are talking about? I just keep thinking of April 1st sitting on the beach and hopefully saying it was worth it all to get here. I constantly remind myself that Mexico is truly a whole different world so adapt now!!!!!!!!!

Immigration is difficult anywhere you go, but please consider that you are dealing with them in your home country in your native language! Here it can get even more complicated as you need to get everything translated, apostled, and notarized. I am going to be posting an article on our homepage later today in regards to immigration and FM3's. As of May 2010 you will no longer be able to apply for FM3's in either Canada or the US. My suggestion is to take a deep breath and try your hardest to figure out what they need in order to get your paperwork in order prior to arriving in Mexico.

Hi! I am new here to this forum and already found a lot of very useful info, thanks:)

Well, I stayed in Playa del Carmen last year with my husband and our son (12 yo) but we left as we were not sure about it.. We are in Miami now as tourists as we are not american citizens (I am brazilian/italian-have both passports, and my husband is argentinian).. So...as we liked it better in PDC than in other places we lived both in Europe and the Americas, we want to give it a shot again..
Our son was home schooled by us in London as it was impossible to have him at a decent school and here in Miami he's a 6th grader at a public school and it's a mess, honestly, in all aspects, and this is the main reason we don't try to solve our papers situation in order to stay here..
You wrote that you drove all the way there .. we would love to be able to do the same but have no idea on how we could drive there (our drivers license from the US expires end of May amd we can't renew now as we're tourists.. Well, I know we sound like some crazy gipsy moving around but we have been looking for a nice not perfect place for the 3 of us..and since my husband and I are very serious about changing careers and started to study Photography, we are really wishing and hoping we can get to stay there at least until our son finishes middle school.. as any other brazilian I love the beach and really felt in peace there.. we all speak spanish and hope my son can make friends as last year it was not good for him(he's a little skater and met some kids where they skate at DIF.. but we were always worried about leaving him there by himself as we didn't know Playa very well.. I think that if we can get him a good start there by being able to enroll him at a good school I m sure that, not only he'd make friends but my husband and I would feel such an immense relief because schooling has been the major unresolved issue all over for us.. we even thought about going to Brazil as the schools are great but we feel unsafe there and too faraway from the rest of the world..! We're both web designers and that's why we can get to travel this much with our kid..
.. as for the FM3, before coming there last year I found out that it would be very easy to get it as all we need to do is to prove a certain income in a foreign country. You mentioned some recent change,,,

Sorry, so many questions!!!! I've been very anxious about our move mainly because of schooling for our son and transportation there..(to the school.. if they have places available for him this year.. but very excited about going back there and practicing Photography in such gorgeous locations..!!

If you have some info for me about taking our car from Miami considering we won't have our DL after May.. that would be great! We could come back here and always get a 6 month renewal.. but since we don't know how the whole thing is we are about to sell our car this coming Tuesday and we just bought it 3 months ago so ...basically we're losing a lot of money..

Thanks a lot!!