Temporary residence — pensioner or rentier
Draft — not checked by us yet
We built these rules from the country’s own sources and have not finished checking them line by line.
Never checked · limit 45 days
We have encoded no rule for this route yet.
Costa Rica
The residence routes we hold for Costa Rica, each requirement as its rule states it, and what a month costs in its cities. This page assesses no one.
This page describes the destination for nobody in particular. Answer a few questions and each requirement is set against your own answers, with a monthly budget for your household. Your answers stay in the address bar of your browser; nothing is stored.
Country in brief
Pros
- Stable democracy, no army, high environmental quality.
- Pensionado and rentista routes with published thresholds.
- Pleasant climate in the Central Valley (Atenas: "best climate in the world").
- Good public healthcare (CCSS) for residents.
- Nature, biodiversity and a large North American expatriate community.
Cons
- High cost of living for Latin America; imports are expensive.
- Bureaucracy is slow; residency processing takes long.
- Infrastructure and roads lag; traffic in San José.
- Rising crime linked to drug transit in recent years.
- Small market; business opportunities concentrated in tourism and services.
Emigrator’s assessment, 6 October 2026. Where a point names a figure, the sourced data above governs.
Routes we hold for Costa Rica
What each rule states, as we encoded it from the source. A money threshold that grows with the size of the household is shown for the reference household named under the costs.
A month here, for a reference household
Reference household: two adults aged 38 and 37, a one-bedroom home, no children.
Residence fees and health cover are those of Temporary residence — pensioner or rentier. The low, middle and high figures are the 25th, 50th and 75th percentiles where a publisher states them; each line says who published it.
illustrative Money figures on this page are illustrative unless the figure names its publisher. The illustrative ones are arranged so the shape is right — a larger flat costs more than a smaller one, and the expensive cities are the expensive ones — and they are accurate in nothing. Do not plan on them.
| City | P25 | P50 | P75 |
|---|---|---|---|
| AtenasThis total does not include Building or service charge, Statutory levies and licences, Residence permit renewals and Domestic help, which nobody publishes for this city. It is the sum of what we hold, not of what the household will pay. | €1,224 | €1,657 | €2,091 |
| San JoséThis total does not include Building or service charge, Statutory levies and licences, Residence permit renewals and Domestic help, which nobody publishes for this city. It is the sum of what we hold, not of what the household will pay. | €1,512 | €2,047 | €2,583 |
Its cities
Atenas
- Safety
- 12 / 100measured
- Healthcare
- 84 / 100measured
- Air quality
- not held
12 of 12 months between 10 and 26 °C
- Jan282319
- Feb292419
- Mar312520
- Apr312521
- May292421
- Jun272421
- Jul272321
- Aug272321
- Sept262321
- Oct262321
- Nov262320
- Dec272319
Each cell: average daily high, monthly mean, average daily low, in °C. These are averages of daily values over 2001–2020, not records — the hottest day is higher and is not shown.
San José
- Safety
- 12 / 100measured
- Healthcare
- 84 / 100measured
- Air quality
- not held
12 of 12 months between 10 and 26 °C
- Jan282319
- Feb292419
- Mar312520
- Apr312521
- May292421
- Jun272421
- Jul272321
- Aug272321
- Sept262321
- Oct262321
- Nov262320
- Dec272319
Each cell: average daily high, monthly mean, average daily low, in °C. These are averages of daily values over 2001–2020, not records — the hottest day is higher and is not shown.
How this country is governed
World Bank Worldwide Governance Indicators, 2024, on a 0–100 scale the Bank publishes itself. They describe the country, not any city in it.
- Political stability and absence of violence
- 86the World Bank governance score for political stability
- Rule of law
- 68the World Bank governance score for rule of law
- Control of corruption
- 62the World Bank governance score for control of corruption
Where this comes from
Provenance
Rule set 1.58.0-2026-10-11 · read on 26 October 2026. Every figure on this page was computed by the engine from versioned rule files. No language model produced any number here, and translation happens only after the calculation.
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This is decision support, not legal advice. Confirm any route with a licensed adviser or the authority before acting.