When it comes to developing a project, it’s not ever easy, but ignoring your neighbor doesn’t make it any more so. The word “neighbor” should encompass not just the local residents nearby, but the country as whole and its institutions. So long as some basic steps and permits required in Nicaraguan legislation are not ignored, sidestepped, or glossed over, Nicaragua is a cakewalk when it comes to building your dream. Compare it to other countries where even the height of your fence or the color you paint it is subject to a discussion by the town council commission of esthetics. This simple principle still escapes some people who have come to develop here.

A builder had a stop work order issued against the construction of a beachfront house, not because the structure is in any way offensive, but because apparently he did not take the necessary steps for building permits, including an environmental impact study, necessary for any development within 80 meters of a coastline, riverbank, or lakeshore. Other developers had begun land-shaping the hills overlooking a stretch of coastline, carving out roads and platforms for housing lots. Once again, some necessary requirements were not being met and they also received a stop work order. Had they treated the authorities with some neighborly respect, they could have avoided some unnecessary hassles.

On the other side of the coin, you have a developer of the Arenas Tolas project at Playa Gigante. Local residents, perhaps a titch resentful of some outsider coming in to develop and make some considerable earnings, had had some run-ins with the investor Armel González in recent years. Realizing that good neighbors are a valuable resource, the project, at its own expense, invested in providing safe drinking water for 43 families making up the local community, thereby appeasing them and local authorities, as well as making a good photo op for his project.