Imagine riding a Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) train during one of those harshly cold and glacial days that descend upon the communities surrounding Lake Michigan just in time for the holidays. You think about making Costa Rica a winter home for you and your family, so you pull up the website of your local real estate broker on your smartphone and browse available properties on the Multiple Listing Service (MLS). You see beachfront homes in Guanacaste that fit your idea of a winter getaway, so you tap the “Contact” button and speak to your local broker about scheduling a viewing.

House hunters in parts of Illinois, northwest Indiana and southern Wisconsin are now seeing properties located in Costa Rica when they browse the listings posted on the websites maintained by their local real estate professionals. They are seeing homes in Guanacaste, Jaco Beach, Escazu, Santa Ana and in many other locations across Costa Rica that are known to draw North American vacationers, seasonal residents and expatriates.

According to a recent news article published by Inman News, property listings from Costa Rica are now appearing alongside those located in the Greater Chicago Metropolitan area; this is due to an agreement between Midwest Real Estate Data (MRED) and its MLS provider dynaConnections. The MRED network consists of 40,000 real estate professionals in Greater Chicago, so these new listings from Costa Rica are now reaching a much greater audience.

 

The Global Real Estate Paradigm

Inman News explains that Costa Rica is not the only international location in the Greater Chicago MLS. Belize and Mexico, two other countries known to attract North American and European expats, are also part of this new project. MRED created a new property type in its MLS to accommodate international listings.

Speaking to Inman News, MRED Chairman Jeff Gregory xplained that:

“Real estate has gone global, and there is no better way for us to support our real estate professionals than to give them the best functionality for international listings in our connectMLS system […]”

These international listings follow the Real Estate Transaction Standard (RETS) and are compliant with the Internet Data Exchange (IDX) format that allows agents to share listings. For example, a seller’s agent in Playa Nosara can share his or her listings with agents in Greater Chicago; by doing this, not only is the seller benefiting from a wider reach but also from the extended IDX features, which include secure collaboration and sharing of information and documents. Here’s a live example of a Chicago real estate agency selling pristine land in Chontales in the Southern Pacific.

For the record, a nationwide, bilingual MLS platform exists in Costa Rica, and it is operated by the Realtor Board of the Chamber of Real Estate. Although the real estate profession is not regulated by the government of Costa Rica, this self-regulated professional group has powerful connections with government officials and other key players in the industry. Through its affiliation with the United States National Association of Realtors (NAR), an influential behemoth of the global real estate market, the Chamber in Costa Rica operates under guidelines similar to those of the NAR, including the recognition of established franchise brands such as Re/Max and Century 21.