Buying Property in Puerto Los Cabos

Yes, foreigners can own in Puerto Los Cabos

Puerto Los Cabos sits on the San Jose Corridor, well inside Mexico’s restricted zone — the strip within 50 km of the coast where foreigners cannot hold direct title to land. This is not an obstacle. It is a paperwork step that thousands of foreign buyers complete in Los Cabos every year.

You take ownership through a fideicomiso: a bank trust in which a Mexican bank holds legal title as trustee, and you are the beneficiary with every right of ownership. You can live in it, renovate it, rent it, sell it, and leave it to your heirs. The bank cannot sell it, encumber it, or do anything with it without your instruction.

The alternative, used mainly by buyers acquiring several properties or running a rental business, is to hold through a Mexican corporation. Which one suits you depends on how you intend to use the property and on your own tax position at home. Decide that before you make an offer, not after — changing it later is expensive.

What closing actually costs a buyer

Budget 5–8% of the purchase price. The percentage falls as the price rises, because several line items are fixed rather than proportional. At Puerto Los Cabos prices the absolute numbers get large quickly, and the top of that range is conservative on the largest purchases.

Worked at real Puerto Los Cabos prices

Indicative ranges for Los Cabos as at August 2026, for orientation only. Exact figures depend on the property, the assessed value and the trustee bank, and are confirmed by your notary in the closing statement. This is general information, not legal or tax advice — take advice from a Mexican notary and your own tax adviser before committing.

Who pays what

The seller pays the brokerage commission and their own capital gains tax (ISR). The buyer pays everything in the table above. There is no equivalent of a US-style buyer-agency fee — my representation of you as a buyer costs you nothing directly.

Five things specific to Puerto Los Cabos

1. Nothing here has ever sold above the asking price

Of 66 recorded Puerto Los Cabos sales in the three years to 26 August 2026, zero closed above the asking price. Seven closed at exactly the asking price — six homesites and one condominium. The other fifty-nine closed below it.

The median sale came in at 92.6% of list, and across all 66 sales $16,918,928 came off $180,270,898 of asking prices — 9.4% of the total. Houses are the starkest case: thirty-one sales, and not one of them reached its asking price.

That is not a claim that every seller will negotiate. It is what sixty-six transactions actually did, with no exceptions in the record at all.

2. But how far below varies by neighborhood

Closed sales, all property types, three years to 26 August 2026. Every one of the seven at-asking sales was a homesite or a condominium; no house in the community has ever matched its asking price.

El Altillo is where the record most supports a serious opening offer: its three house sales gave up $995,000, $589,000 and $100,000. Fundadores houses concede less in percentage terms — a 5.4% median — but they concede every time.

3. Forty-two per cent of the money on the market sits behind two sales

The two Ritz-Carlton enclaves hold $86,499,000 of listings against two recorded sales. Puerto Los Cabos has $204,191,093 on the market in total, so that one address is 42% of the money and 3% of the transactions.

The highest asking price there is $29,950,000. The highest price any property has closed at anywhere in the community, at any address, is $8,675,000. Four of the eight Ritz-Carlton listings ask more than that community record.

None of that makes those prices wrong — branded oceanfront property can trade well outside a local record. It means the usual check is unavailable, and an independent appraisal is doing real work rather than ticking a box. Both recorded sales there closed at a double-digit discount: 10.0% and 15.3%.

4. Do not buy on price per square foot here

This site quotes prices and never a price per square foot, and that is deliberate. The MLS records a single area figure per listing, and for Puerto Los Cabos houses it is inconsistent: records run from 1,004 to 4,525 square feet per bedroom, and seven of thirty-one imply more than 2,500. Those are reading as lot area, not constructed area.

Dividing price by that field produces figures from $142 to $923 per square foot across the same community, which tells you nothing. Only three condominiums have sold here in three years, which is too few to average either.

Ask instead for the specific constructed area and the specific lot area of the property in front of you, in writing.

5. Two things the MLS will hide from you

The Ritz-Carlton enclaves are filed under two inconsistent names. The MLS records them as West Enclave Ritz-Carlton — hyphenated and singular — and North Enclaves Ritz Carlton, unhyphenated and plural. Searching one string returns only that enclave. With two recorded sales between them, a comparables list built on one spelling is missing half the evidence there is.

Some asking prices are developer schedule prices, not valuations. Figures quoted to the dollar — $631,704, $538,027, $505,108 — come off a price sheet rather than from comparable sales. Three recorded Fundadores lot sales and five current listings across the community carry them. All three of those sales closed in 2026, at 75.2%, 79.2% and 88.7% of the number on the sheet. In El Altillo, three lots all listed at exactly $523,000 closed at $450,000, $435,000 and $435,000.

Both are worth mentioning to whoever prepares a valuation for you, and both are easy to check.