For the move-here crowd
So you want to move to Santa Teresa.
Plenty of people come for two weeks and quietly start pricing rentals. If that's you, here's the honest version — what it actually takes to live here, room by room, from people who made the move themselves.
What you'll need to figure out
Visas & staying legal
Tourist-visa runs, temporary residency, and what's realistic for a long stay.
Cost of living
What rent, groceries, and the everyday actually run — high season vs low.
Long-term rentals
Where to look, what to expect, and how to avoid the high-season trap.
Healthcare
Public (Caja) vs private, the nearest clinics and hospital, and insurance.
Internet & working
Fiber vs 4G, coworking spaces, and the realities of remote work here.
Getting settled
Banking, a vehicle, the community groups, and the safety basics.
Read the deep-dives
- Digital Nomads
Best Coworking Spaces in Santa Teresa
Internet speeds, desk setups, community vibes, and pricing, the coworking spaces that actually support real work.
- Digital Nomads
Cost of Living in Santa Teresa: Realistic Monthly Budget
Real monthly costs in Santa Teresa, rent, groceries, eating out, coworking, transport, with a low/mid/comfortable budget table in USD for 2026.
- Long-term
Moving to Santa Teresa: The Honest Version
What living here is really like: residency, border runs, finding a rental, internet, healthcare, schools, community, and the trade-offs nobody warns you about.
- Long-term
Starting a Business in Santa Teresa
Permits, costs, competition, and the realities of running a business in a small Costa Rican beach town.
- Digital Nomads
Wi-Fi and Internet Reliability in Santa Teresa
Realistic expectations for internet in Santa Teresa, speeds, backup options, which cafes have real Wi-Fi, and what to do when it goes down.
- Digital Nomads
Santa Teresa for Digital Nomads: The Practical Guide
Coworking spaces, Wi-Fi cafés, SIM cards, monthly rentals, cost of living, best neighborhoods, and how to build a life here, written for people who work remotely and want to actually get things done.
Coming soon
The complete Move-to-Santa-Teresa guide
We're putting everything — visas, costs, rentals, healthcare, the lot — into one practical guide. Leave your email and you'll be first to know when it's ready, plus the Friday Dispatch in the meantime.