Nowhere have I seen "seller can cancel if buyer asks for or inquires about a repair credit, price reduction, comments about the pink bathroom, etc."

. :-)@Mike Lambert - Cartagena is a gorgeous city, but as far as investing goes it's like Costa Rica.

We live in a gorgeous place, have a luxury villa project and our own real estate agency, working in a market that is considered to be the fastest growing one in all Latin America.I wanted to hear from other people who have moved from big western cities to tropical countries to chase their dream.

I wouldn't be intimidated by HOAs...often times HOAs are just in place to pay for maintenance of the neighborhood sign, pool, clubhouse, & to prevent you from painting your house hot pink :)You should be able to drive through the neighborhood and look at the different houses and get a pretty good feel for how strict the HOA guidelines are...If every house is immaculate, with similar architecture and exterior finishes then the HOA is likely to be very strict and you may need to be concerned about the HOA covenants & restrictions...With that said, as other have recommended, have your realtor pull the HOA fee & association bylaws and covenants/restrictions to find out what you are getting into...

Basically, I like the pink and orange lines.  

It seems like a great town that's growing and some of the houses are actually gorgeous. 

From experience I'm not convinced on the air purge method.Instead I use a 3/4 HP submersible pump in a 5 gallon bucket & pump fluid (usually the pink 'food grade' RV anti-freeze) through the lines.

For example you can't expect high rent when the place looks like 1970's with green carpet and pink formica counter tops.

They can even decide that you can't rent out your condo, or that you have to paint it hot pink with lime green trim, and there is nothing you can do about it.

I have a gorgeous duplex in a nice neighborhood in Rochester, NY.