Osprey - 11-22-2009 at 09:08 AM
The Three M’s
The thread about East Cape and where to stay took me back down memory lane and thoughts of money, margaritas and mortgages.
There are nine fishing resorts in Palmas Bay – I’ve not stayed at all of them but in the almost 40 years of visiting/living here I’ve learned a little
about them, how they work. Sportfishing has brought them to a place where almost 400 charter boats now operate; the resorts have a potential annual
income of nearly $20,000,000 U.S. dollars.
For the most part the resort facilities, the land and buildings, enjoy a debt free existence. Given that they have no debt service looming over their
heads every month, the atmosphere at most of them is casual and client friendly even when times are tough. Likewise the Mexicans who run the places
live in homes in nearby villages and enjoy the same pressure-free living without a mortgage obligation.
Under those conditions the resorts grew slowly, one cement block at a time, when cash was available to buy that block, have it laid. Same with the
humble homes of the resort workers. Not fiscal responsibility, fiscal constraints hold the whole place together in a hammock siesta kind of misty
paradise by the sea theme. In that light, mortgages are the paradise killers of our day.
Without the pressure of the debt, the resorts, at times, look like family run businesses bent on pleasing people, providing work for the villagers and
making a small profit or just breaking even. In that atmosphere time can stay in the Mexican abstract and things like deferred maintenance and capital
improvements are rarely the subject of serious discussion.
Now business for profit has found its way down here and things are changing fast. Mortgage loans for land draws and build-out have begun to change the
landscape and the atmosphere. Now new people with high hopes are scrunched down with pen, paper and calculator working all the numbers back to the
debt --- so many thousand margaritas at $12 each, minus the cost of the ice, mix, alcohol, salt, the bartender and the dish washer…….
Boggles the mind. I may write a story, a book, no, maybe a movie. Fiction. The plot calls for mortgages to show up here, hot and heavy, in the 70s,
right after the highway pushed through. I’ll paint the bay, the resort, the villages with the gilt of all those billions of mortgage pesos, then
repaint it again and again after the collapse/rebirth/rebuilding and the final abandonment where I show the wild dogs digging in the rubble searching
for scraps.
No rocket science down here. Even the humble fishermen will be laughing at the prospect of new Maya Rivieras here. The laugh belies a deadly serious
truth; sometimes the fish don’t come around and when they don’t show the clients go somewhere else.
Maybe somebody will invent a flexible goodtimes/badtimes mortgage plan where you only have to pay when you have the money. Sounds like a good idea for
a Mexican corporation with headquarters in Rosarita Beach.
Howard - 11-22-2009 at 09:51 AM
And all this time I thought 3M made scotch tape and was based in Minnesota
BajaGringo - 11-22-2009 at 10:12 AM
The stress free life of no mortgage and very low property tax on a remote stretch of beach is a large part of the reason why I am here...
shari - 11-22-2009 at 10:16 AM
stress free life, no mortgage, million dollar lot for a grand, year round swimming, warm sand, great people and TECATE...that's why I'm here.
Udo - 11-22-2009 at 10:18 AM
The underlying theme of the story (and this is not fiction from Osprey), is the stress free life of no debt. Make do with what is currently available.
Barry A. - 11-22-2009 at 10:26 AM
Yep-------no debt and adaquate income and a happy successful family-------what more could you want-------works anyplace in the civilized world,
(almost).
Life is good!!!
Barry
monoloco - 11-22-2009 at 12:08 PM
I always laugh when I hear someone comment on how poor the Mexicans are here. At least most of them own their own home unencumbered by a mortgage,
something that very few people in the US can say.