140. Living in Mexico: How to Find and Secure a Rental

In this episode of the "Living in Mexico" series, I'm sitting down with my husband to walk you through our entire housing journey here in León, Guanajuato. I'm answering one of your most-asked questions: How do you actually find a place to live in Mexico? Spoiler alert: it's not as simple as browsing Zillow! 

I'm sharing all the things I wish someone had told us before we started house hunting. If you're thinking about making the move to Mexico or you're just curious about what expat life really looks like, this episode is packed with practical advice and hard-earned lessons.

For detailed show notes, visit vivalamami.com/episode140

What You'll Hear

• Why we chose León and how we fell in love with this city during what was supposed to be just a vacation
• The reality of renting in Mexico
• How we actually found our house, what made us say yes to this property, and why location became our top priority
• Our landlord struggles and the maintenance issues we're dealing with

Resources Mentioned

• Inmobiliario websites for finding legitimate rental listings in Mexico: Lamudi, Inmuebles24, Trovit, Vivanuncios
• Facebook groups for housing in León (link available upon request)

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Transcript

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for us, we didn't know the city until we literally decided to just walk around. Mm-hmm. In, in. Los Las Colonia to visit, you know, just like the, the mall and everything. And so it all happened to feel like, right. It all happened to feel like this could be potentially a city where we would live at. so we thought that Leon was going to be. Well enough for us to not just immerse ourselves here in Mexico, where our family is from, but it also gave us the comfortability of like Chicago. Mm-hmm. I feel like Chicago is big enough, has a lot of resources. Obviously it's a big city in the United States, and we felt that Leon was pretty comparable. Yeah. In terms of resources, in terms of different types of food. Different, um, you know, all of these things. It really helped us inform our decision, uh, to move here. Ola. Ola. Welcome to another episode of the Viva AMI Podcast. I'm your host, Jessica Cuevas, and this is one of the Living in Mexico series episodes, as you probably know we are living here in Mexico and. Today I have my husband here, Alex, with me, and in fact, you're going to keep listening to him and he's going to join us throughout these upcoming Living in Mexico episodes just because he is also part of this process. It's not just me as a couple, as a married couple. We both worked on this together, so that way we made this possible in our move to Mexico and. These upcoming episodes are all based on questions that I've been asked on Instagram, on other forms of media, even through email. And so, because I know that you have all of these dire questions, I was like, you know what? I'm gonna spend these upcoming weeks answering your questions and kind of give you a better idea of what it's like living in Mexico So if you haven't yet followed me on Instagram. I am there. I'm also on TikTok, not so much as Instagram, but also if you are curious to watch this episode, you can also find us on YouTube, which is at viva ami, and you can see our backgrounds. Right now we are in our patio, in our house here in Leon Guanajuato, so this episode is specific to housing. A lot of people have asked us like, how did you find this house? How do you even rent a house in Mexico? And a lot of times people go to Mexico to just visit, whether if it's vacation or if it's visiting family. And so there are a lot of nuances and a lot of like specific. Ways of finding and getting housing here in Mexico, and we're just gonna share kind of like what our experience was and how it's going. And I can't answer specifically about buying property or. About transferring, uh, assets like many families do. So we're only going to speak about how to find a rental, especially a long term rental then like an Airbnb or something that, you know, you could just stay at at Abuelita's house. So one of the questions that we have been asked is, how did you decide to find. A place to live. And so, Alex, I don't know if you wanna answer this for us. I'm sure Justice already talked about this in the past, right? But we came here when Mattel was about a few months old. Yeah, he was like eight months old and I had, uh, about four weeks of paternity leave. So then, uh, when we came here to alone in the city, we just fell in love with it. Mm-hmm. Right. And then, I can't remember if it was me or you, the one that just said, Hey, why don't we just move here? And hypothetically, and then it just happened. She didn't think I was serious.'cause before I was like, oh yeah, I'll never move out of the states, but hey, here we are. Right. Yeah. We, we came here on somewhat a vacation and then. Somehow, some way we just decided to stay here. Yeah. Yeah. Which is wild, right? Yeah. It's, and, and I think for us, we didn't know the city until we literally decided to just walk around. Mm-hmm. In, in. Los Las Colonia to visit, you know, just like the, the mall and everything. And so it all happened to feel like, right. It all happened to feel like this could be potentially a city where we would live at. And initially we thought about moving to Mexico City. But we've realized that that is a huge city. Yeah. Especially when raising two little kids. I feel like it's just chaotic enough. And we come from a city, I mean, we, we were both born and raised in Chicago. So we know what it's like to live in a big metropolitan city as a family. But Mexico City felt like the New York, like it is a completely different monster. Yeah. Right? Yeah. I mean, don't get me, don't get us wrong, it's beautiful, right? There's so many things to do, but you gotta take into consideration there's 20 million people living there. Right. So once we thought about it, we looked at some pictures when we were there, we were just like, yeah, there's no way. Yeah. There's no way we can do this. Yeah. Yeah. It, it felt like New York, and I love New York City. I. Love the, just like everything about it, but not to live there. It's more so to visit. We can always explore more and learn more. And in fact, we're going to Mexico City to see the bad bunny. But yeah. And so that's just another way, an excuse to keep visiting Mexico City.'cause it's only like a four hour drive if you take the bus. Mm. But anyway, so we thought that Leon was going to be. Well enough for us to not just immerse ourselves here in Mexico, where our family is from, but it also gave us the comfortability of like Chicago. Mm-hmm. I feel like Chicago is big enough, has a lot of resources. Obviously it's a big city in the United States, and we felt that Leon was pretty comparable. Yeah. In terms of resources, in terms of different types of food. Different, um, you know, all of these things. It really helped us inform our decision, uh, to move here. Now, in terms of finding where in Leon, I think we factored in based on the availability, probably. Mm-hmm. Probably. And the location I would say. School was something that we definitely wanted to base our decision, but unfortunately that didn't work out. No, because we, I guess we should have done it the other way. We should have probably have looked at housing, well, first and then school, but we did the other way around. Yeah, we looked at the school first and then housing. We couldn't find a, a house for rent near the kids' school. Now where the kids are, they're in the central part of the city, like near the city center in Leon. And we're living in the north side of Leon, so it's called La Zona Norte, which is where La Plaza Mayor. If, for those of you who have ever been to Leon, it's pretty much where the. Second phase of the city's expansion grew, now it's expanding more south. Uh, so Leon is a big city. It first started out in the city center and then it expanded to the north and then the south. And we are in the, in the northern part of it. And this is what drew us really, because everything is at our disposal. I mean, literally behind us. Is a parking lot to Sam's Club. Walmart too. There's a Walmart, there's a Home Depot. You know, just like your typical American stores. Yeah, there's like a lot of cute like boutiques, coffee shops and coffee shops. A lot of little restaurants. Restaurants. Yeah. So there's a lot of options here and that's what really drew us and the way that we found this house was through. A Facebook post that was shared to me by one of my friends. So I have a really good friend that we've kept in touch for over a decade now. Like we weren't even moms, we weren't married. It's almost and everything. And uh, I happen to have known her. From like a long time ago that I visited my family here in Mexico and we have kept in touch. And so knowing that we were moving to Leon, she was like the first person, one of the first few people that I reached out to, because she's also from Leon. She was born and raised here, so she knows how, how it is, and so through a Facebook group post of this property, she shared it with me and I was like, Hey, we have to check it out and. In the spring, uh, I came here with the kids. And you did two, right? Well, there were two. Yes. Yes. There were two phases of our spring trip travels. Yeah. The first time, the first time we came, this one we checked out like what, like 20 schools? Yeah. We visited a bunch of schools. The second one was you came by yourself, right? That was in your Yeah. To enroll the school schools? No. Oh, no, no. This was when we enrolled the kids. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, to the schools and. At that time, that was when we, I reached out to the, the representative of the, uh, property owners and I was like, Hey, can we tour the, the, the house? And he was like, sure. So I got to see it. I got to see it with my parents and the kids, and I felt really good about it. And I told Alex, I was like, Hey, you know, this is a really good property because. Even though it's an older property, it is in a residential area, so it's in a fraccionamiento. For those of you who haven't heard of what a fraccionamiento is, it's essentially like a private residence. Mm-hmm. Essentially. Yeah. Essentially it's a G It's a, it is a gated community. Yeah. It's a gated community. I hate saying that because. You know what we think of gated communities, but, uh, yes, it, you do have to have access if you don't live here to get through these doors. Everyone here is pretty chill, you know? Mm-hmm. No problems. Like I haven't heard of any drama or anything. Um, so yeah, so it, it's a really neat community. Traditionally now, I, I think the newer s they often have like a, a pool and like a activity like community center of some sort. This one just has properties and a Yeah, and a little mini, it's super old school chapel, which is, it's old school, but it's very nice. Yeah. Very, very quiet. Yeah. I mean, there's people running in the mornings, there's people running, walking their dogs in the middle of the night. Mm-hmm. So, yeah, it's super quiet here. Yeah, it's pretty quiet. And that's something that I, I. Fell in love with, to be honest, because I knew that my kids were going to be safe. I knew that I, I can go outside anytime and not worry about like cars passing through. Uh, because where the kids go to school, that's where the houses are kind of like in the public basically, and they're in busy streets and everything. And so I felt like. Going into a community like this would be more fitting for our family and our active kids and making sure that they're okay. Um, and so, so yeah, so that's how I toured it in the spring. And first of all, everyone uses WhatsApp. Mm-hmm. And for me, I never really use WhatsApp even though my grandpa uses it. My parents, I still don't use it. Yeah. And that's one of the things that I had to get used to responding back to WhatsApp. And that has been a form of communication really from anyone here. And so I knew that I had to be proactive in checking my phone and my messages because I, low key had set up the WhatsApp notifications off because I was like, I never receive anything through that, but I guess. I had to change those settings, especially when we knew we were going to live here. And so that was the way that I was in communication with, I, I wouldn't necessarily say that it's the realtor because I don't think he is a realtor. No. And here, um, here in Mexico, at least in Leon specifically, you don't have to have a license to show rental properties, right? Mm-hmm. To sell properties. Yes, you do, but not to show them. So that's one thing. If you are interested in MO or locating here or anywhere in Mexico. Make sure that it's a reputable person. Yeah, trustworthy person. Yeah. And I would say this guy was pretty professional. You know, he was on top of things and everything. Uh, but I, I wish we would've known that. Mm-hmm. There are other ways, like the way that we found out, found this house out. Like I said, it was through this Facebook like group post. It wasn't through an inmobiliario. So inmobiliario is like a real estate agency, and. It wasn't listed through that. And there are inmobiliarios to either buy a house or to rent a house, and that's when you can find a reputable, you know, license, uh, realtor. Yeah. And, and unfortunately this property wasn't tied in with that. Now the property alone has been fine. Uh, I would say, but there have been a lot of issues, which we'll kind of talk about that. Okay. But at, in terms of actually securing this house, how would you rate that experience? Yeah. On a scale from one to 10, securing this property about a eight, eight Difficulty wise, because, um, yeah, there was a lot of legal mm-hmm. Stuff that we had to do, right? Like we had to get, um. Your grandfather. Right. And essentially it is like collateral, right? They have, we had, he had to put hi his property as collateral so that we can rent it. Rent this one. Mm-hmm. Right? So it is not just like, oh, here, here are the keys. Gimme the money. No. We had to go to a lawyer, sign a bunch of documents and yeah, I was very surprised. Honestly, I don't even think you have to do that back in the States. Mm-hmm. Have somebody that's collateral. No, because we are property owners ourselves and, and we have three different tenants in those three units that we own that building. And it was all up to us, you know, to have the contract and everything. And now granted we are in the city of Chicago, so Chicago is very. Rental friendly, hard, like on landlords and Yes. Mm-hmm. More rental renter friendly than anything. And so in order for us to cover our bases, like we wanted to make sure to have a contract and everything, kind of like an order. It's legalized. Like you had to have an attorney to sign the contract. And so this is what it's called, a póliza jurídica. Which essentially it legitimizes the rental and it protects both parties. So in a way I was grateful that that was one of the, you know, rules to, to rent this property is to have this signed. But it did come with a couple bureaucratic steps, right? Where it wasn't just us that we were able to rent this place. It had to get through with my grandpa, and we were lucky because my parents. Even though my dad has land and they're in the process of building their house, What It's called las escrituras. And so las escrituras is like a legal document that basically legitimizes your property, your tierra, and, and so luckily my grandparents are near us and we were able to bring him over and have him sign. For us, essentially, because that was the only way that we were able to get this property. In terms of what it involved with any like deposit or cost. We did have to pay the first month's rent, like as a deposit, and that was non-refundable, which is pretty common, just like anywhere else. So we actually secured this place like months in advance. So when we toured the property and everything, it was like what May? Mm-hmm. Or June. That was when we paid that one month's deposit e. That way it secures the, the, the property. So I guess they were able to do that and, and that was great. And then we then had to pay, you know, the first Yeah. Rent and, and so forth. And. In terms of the costs specifically, I would say for us, especially coming from the United States and coming from Chicago, warehousing is ridiculous. It is cheaper for us. Very affordable. It's very affordable. So we pay 20,000 pesos, and it is a furnished home. So usually furnished houses or furnished apartments in Mexico are going to be a little bit more because that includes. Just like what you get. Yeah. All the furniture, the tables. Yeah. Dishware. Everything. Everything. So that was one of the, the things that we were looking for specifically, that we wanted to make sure that in order for us to acclimate ourselves here and not bring all our stuff, because we still don't know if we're gonna live here forever. Uh, we thought that it would be best to rent a furnished property. Yeah. So in from Mexico and for people who are from Mexico. This house is a lot more expensive. Mm-hmm. I would say, and especially in a city like Leon, where it is in Mexico City or Guadalajara, uh, it or Monterey, like it is a little bit more expensive than your traditional kind of, or typical like rental costs, maybe maximum for a furnished home. I think you're pushing it like 17,000 pesos. So we're paying 3000 pesos more than your kind of like average type of house that is furnished, but it is what it is. Yeah. And and it's not like they, uh, scam does or whatever, like the 20,000 pesos was what it was in the original posting without them even knowing that we were American. Right. Yeah. And I mean. Yeah. When you take into consideration, I mean, we are walking distance from one of the biggest malls in Leon. Mm-hmm. I mean, it is a gated community. There's so many things to do around this area, but again, it is what it is. Yeah. And I would say that this house has more, uh, space. I think it, it's more spacious than your traditional house now in Leon. Mm-hmm. Just because it is getting oversaturated. Uh, I think. Because, yeah, it's getting a little overpopulated here in Leon'cause it's a booming city and so. Being that this residential area is must like, you know, it's like what, 30, 40 years old? It is a lot more spacious. And that's what I like. I mean, I like that we have a big patio. Yeah, I like that. It's got three rooms, two and a half baths, a full, uh, dining area, living room, a full kitchen, and so. I think that we're paying pretty decent, I think. Yeah. Yeah. It's decent. Yeah. Yeah. And I just wanted to add a quick, another quick point too, uh, kind of taking it back to just kind of like comparing it, if we would've brought our stuff here as opposed to just renting a furnish place. We kind of looked into it how much it would cost us to bring all of our stuff here via trucks, right? Mm-hmm. How much was it with like$20,000? Mm-hmm. One quote. Mm-hmm. To bring all of our stuff here. Yeah. It's about 15 to$20,000. Yeah. So if you factor that in, I mean, we would've been spending a lot more money to bring all of our stuff here to rent something that would would've been like, what, 15,000 pesos. So it kind of like balances out. Mm-hmm. And if not, we are, the way we did it kind of saved us a lot more money than if we would've brought our stuff here. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And trying to figure out, okay, is your move to Mexico going to be long term? Mm-hmm. Or is it going to be short term? And for us, we do have a storage back in the United States where it has, I would say, the more precious things. Well, I don't even know what we, we have different definitions as to what that means. I mean, if it was for me, I would've gotten rid of everything in there to put whatever. I know. I know. And it's hard. It's hard to figure out, okay, are we starting new? Are we starting? Like are we restarting our lives back? Like I honestly don't know and I don't wanna stress out. Yeah. But I think though for now, I think it's worked out that we got a furnished home. Yeah, for sure. And, and yeah, it's been working out well and we were a, we've been able to kind of personalize it. I definitely told the landlord that for the kids' room, I definitely wanted everything out because that room had like a, which is like a full-sized bed, and I was like, yeah, no, my kids are not gonna share the same bed. Mm-hmm. Because they can push each other. Could you imagine all the screaming and, and crying? Yeah. You just, I don't even wanna imagine. So what we decided to do was buy them their furniture, so mm-hmm. We got them their two little beds eat, which is like a little bookshelf and, and yeah, it. It's been really cute, like seeing that. And they love it. They love their room even though sometimes they come in the middle of the night and sleep with us, but whatever. Still, still, it's been over years that they've been doing that, but yeah. Yeah. That's, that's how they are. It is what it is. Yeah. It's fine. Now that we live in a, in a rental, uh, something that. We know that in the, is that this rental is for a year, and so within this year it's literally stated that it is our responsibility if things break down or if I don't know if we need like a new light bulb. So that's one of the things that is kind of interesting in Mexico compared to the US, especially in Chicago, is that the tenant here is, doesn't have as equal rights as. In Chicago, so it's all up to us. Even though we are renting, it's still our responsibility if I don't know if, yeah, I mean there's something minor. I would say it's different, but in a lot of ways it's similar, right? Because just like back in Chicago to here, like the landlord is responsible for anything that's major, major repair. Mm-hmm. Right? And just like Chicago too, like even like for something small, if you read it in the contract, that the renter is responsible for such and such a certain amount. Somewhat similar here, so Yeah. Yeah, and it all depends who you get. Mm-hmm. Let's be honest, Alex, about the landlords here. overall, I think that they are responsive, that they listen. That they're willing to have a conversation, but I feel like they are a little difficult in terms of trying to solve the issue. Yeah. And I don't think they wanna solve any specific issues. Yeah, that's true. I mean, again, like who, who wants to drop a lot of money on a property, right? I mean. But again, like my argument in this situation is, is that if they don't, if they want to keep this place long term, they have to invest in it. They have to invest, right? Mm-hmm. But, um, again, the landlord slumlords here, which they are, let's be honest. I mean, I mean not fully, because I think that. Again, they respond, they communicate, but it's almost like slapping a bandaid over a huge wound. SAC. Right, because like, again, like the one example, and we can move on to something else, right? There is a little room out, right? Where it is back in the day, like if you had a nanny, they had, they have their own personal spot here. Mm-hmm. Long story short, it's been in, it's been flooded, right? And it's been going on for who knows how long, right? Mm-hmm. But. We told'em, they came one, they, they had an, they had a quote from actual professional, what do you call it? A a, which is a brick layer. Right. Um, I'm assuming that they didn't like the quote, so they got this one dude that basically does everything. Right. The maintenance. Yeah. Then Manto, he's, he's a good dude, right? But let's just say that he didn't fix it the way it's supposed to be fixed. It still floods up there. Mm-hmm. But And they don't. Yeah. Yeah. And the thing is that even though we don't utilize it, I mean, it's nowhere near to be in living. Mm-hmm. You know, you can't live, it's, it's just a storage area. It, we use it for storage. So that's where we have our mallets are the container boxes that we brought our stuff with in the car. Like, so we do use that space for storage, but that's even though. Yeah, it's not livable. I still utilize it. What's under that cio? So, essentially the, the CIO is like on a second level and what's under CIO is the laundry room, and that's where I do laundry. And even though I don't do laundry every day or I'm not there 24 7, I feel afraid that that. Ceiling is gonna fall on top of me because of it has deteriorated. Yeah. It's, it's deteriorating because of the flooding and, and I've been telling the landlord like, Hey, this is an issue because I feel like it's literally gonna fall on top of me. And so she's not as responsive as we thought she would. Considering that these two are professionals, they pride themselves when I first met them, that they own four properties. And so I just wonder how they treat the others, the other tenants. Yeah. And I also wonder, like I, I don't wanna judge, but I feel like they only want our money. Of course. And of course like, you know, that's how we feel when we receive rent, right? We want our money to not just pay for the mortgage that we. Own our property, but it's also for any of the, uh, source of income that we're getting from. Mm-hmm. But it's also like, okay, if you want your tenants to stay long term, you also have to think about that investment. So I don't think they're thinking about this. ROI, right? Yeah. Return on investment on investing on their property so that these tenants can stay long term. And so we know that at least in this property, even though it's, I, I love it here. I mean, I never got bad juju vibes. Like, I remember, remember when I told you when we moved in, I was like, oh, I'm gonna put Palo Santo. And well, I haven't even been doing that because I, I feel good energy here. I'm glad you didn't.'cause I hate that smell. Well, I love it, smell. Um, but yeah, I feel really good energy and, and I feel like comfortable. I feel good. Yeah. I think my issue are is the, the landlords are mm-hmm. What's keeping me from even considering renewing the contract, I don't think we are yet. Yeah. Not if we decide to stay here. Yeah. Honestly, I didn't like her the first time I met her. I didn't like her, but whatever. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And I know that, I don't know if we've rushed into like finding housing because there's always housing available. Mm-hmm. We still see. Uh, Alex joined this Facebook group about like renting, you know, properties here in Leon, but I don't know, I just felt driven into the location. I think location was definitely a big one, and the fact that it was furnished, not all. Properties are furnished. Mm-hmm. Um, so, but yeah, you live and learn and I think one of the things that I would recommend if you are thinking about moving to Mexico and renting when you first move is to look for inmobiliario. I think that is more legitimate than finding a Facebook post some realtors and inmobiliarios like real estate. Agencies will be posting on social media, but understanding where that link comes from. Mm-hmm. Understanding who this person is, who posted it, because I think it's more legitimate if you go through a real estate. Yeah, for sure. And we can provide a link to that website. Mm-hmm. Even though we didn't use it. I mean, I'm constantly on there almost every day. Right. Yeah. Just checking out posts, checking out rentals. I mean, it is legit. Yeah. Yeah. And this is only for Leon, but there is a. Bigger website and it's for the public, for anyone to filter through properties around, Mexico. And so you can search based on the city or co colonia and you can filter in if you are looking for a house to buy or a house to rent or an apartment. And you can choose up to how many bedrooms and baths you want. And so this website, uh, is pretty comprehensive. Now the thing is though, with this website, it can be anyone posting the property, but if again, you have to dig a little bit deeper and figure out, okay, who posted it? Is it an ilario? Okay, then instead of me going directly through this website, I'm then gonna get my research and then go directly to the emo larios like contact. And that way you know that it was a legitimate posting than just like anyone posting it. If you have any questions about our ZA to Mexico and housing, let me know. Let us know. You can email me at podcast@vivala.com or you can send me a DM at viva la stay tuned. With this month's living in Mexico series, I will be bringing Alex back because for some reason y'all love to listen to him. Wow, okay. All of episodes. I'm so honored you. You didn't know that, right? No, I didn't. All of the episodes that you've been here on the show have been like the most popular ones, so clearly you wanna listen to my man, what can I say? But also. Stay tuned as I announce an upcoming event. This will be a free workshop on how to get dual citizenship, and I will be offering more information about that. But this event will be in early November. It will be kind of like a live event where if you sign up, you will have exclusive access. And for anyone listening after that, well, they're just gonna get the basic information. So. I will be sharing that more in the show notes or description of this video slash episode. And yeah, reach out to us if you have any questions. All right, amiga, well Asima and I'll catch you in the next episode. Peace out.