Learn the difference between a guarantee trust (fideicomiso) vs mortgage (hipoteca) in Costa Rica and how to finance property with familiar, secure loan structures.
Many foreigners buying in Costa Rica have never heard the word fideicomiso. By the end of this, you'll understand why it’s actually what you’re used to—and in some ways, an improvement on it.
If you are an American or Canadian looking to buy a home in Costa Rica, you have likely spent time researching neighborhoods, prices, and the buying process. When you get to the financing stage, you’ll see the term fideicomiso, or a guarantee trust.
A fideicomiso de garantía, or a guarantee trust, is Costa Rica's functional equivalent of a U.S. deed of trust.
Mortgage is a term most American buyers know well. When you see guarantee trust, you might wonder if it is a normal or safe way to buy a house. It is. In fact, it works just like a deed of trust—the standard home loan structure in about half of the United States, including California, Texas, and Colorado.
This article explains how a guarantee trust (fideicomiso) compares to a mortgage (hipoteca), why a guarantee trust is familiar to U.S. borrowers, and what to look for when choosing a lender in Costa Rica.
Before we get into the details, one thing is worth knowing: in everyday conversation, most people—including real estate agents, lawyers, and lenders—refer to any home loan as a "mortgage," regardless of whether it's technically a mortgage or a guarantee trust/deed of trust. You'll even notice here, at Second Street, we say we offer mortgages. The distinction matters when it comes to understanding your rights and protections, but day-to-day, the terms are used interchangeably.
A mortgage is a legal agreement between two parties:
With a mortgage, the lender registers a lien directly on the home’s title as security and the borrower repays the loan over time. Once the loan is paid off, the lien is removed. If payments are not made, the lender has the legal right to recover the property through a formal foreclosure process.
In the U.S., mortgages are common in states in the Northeast and Midwest—but they are only one of two standard home loan structures used.
In Costa Rica, this structure is called a hipoteca, which directly translates to mortgage.
A guarantee trust does the same job as a mortgage—securing a loan against a property—but the structure is different. Instead of two parties there are three:
A lien is not placed directly on the property’s title, rather the trustee holds legal title on behalf of the borrower and the lender during the life of the loan. Once the loan is paid in full, the trustee transfers the title to the borrower. It’s important to note that the trustee’s role is limited to holding and releasing the legal title—that’s it. Clean and simple.
In the United States, this structure is called a deed of trust—the standard approach in California, Texas, Colorado, and about half the country. In Costa Rica, this structure is called a fideicomiso, or a guarantee trust. The concept is the same, just a different name.
A guarantee trust, or a fideicomiso de garantía, is not an unusual structure—it is how serious real estate financing is done in Costa Rica, regularly used each day by local banks, title companies, and some private lenders. When Second Street structures your loan this way, we are working within a well-established legal framework while offering you the 30-year, fixed-rate, U.S.-style loans you expect.
A side-by-side view makes the structures easier to understand:
If you have purchased a home in the United States, there’s a good chance you’ve already used a structure like a guarantee trust. The deed of trust—the U.S. equivalent of a guarantee trust (fideicomiso)—is the standard home loan structure in some of the biggest real estate markets in the country, including:
Many of these states were once Spanish or Mexican territories, and as their property law developed over time, trust structures became the favored choice—the same legal tradition that runs through Costa Rica’s framework today.
When you see a guarantee trust in Costa Rica, you are looking at the same type of legal document used to buy homes in places like San Francisco, Dallas, and Denver. So if the structure feels familiar, that’s because it is.
When it’s done right by a legitimate lender, a guarantee trust doesn’t just get you into your home with financing—it comes with real advantages that a hipoteca can’t provide.
When foreign buyers finance property in Costa Rica, they want the same thing they'd want at home: a straightforward loan, predictable payments, and a structure they can trust.
That's exactly what the fideicomiso makes possible. Second Street uses the guarantee trust structure to offer 30-year, fixed-rate, USD-based loans—no balloon payments, no adjustable rates, and no unexpected surprises. Just a fixed monthly payment for the life of the loan, the same way it would work in the United States. Second Street offers the most efficient transaction structure available for international clients in Costa Rica, saving you real cash at closing and offering full up-front transparency.
Unlike a mortgage, a guarantee trust keeps your financial life private. In Costa Rica, property records are public—anyone can search the National Registry (Registro Nacional) by name, corporation (searchable by name), or lot number and pull up full ownership details and mortgage loan terms, including the lender, loan amount, interest rate, term, and monthly payment. You can even look up a lender’s transactions and actual terms here, if they use hipotecas. Click here to access instructions in English to learn how to search the National Registry.
With a guarantee trust, none of that information is visible in the National Registry. The title is held by the trustee, so your name and your loan information stay out of the public record entirely. Second Street uses a guarantee trust, ensuring your privacy.
In Costa Rica, a mortgage (hipoteca) requires a 0.5% government recording fee at closing. By using a guarantee trust (fideicomiso) with Second Street, that fee doesn’t apply—saving money on closing day. On a $300,000 loan, that’s a savings of $1,500.
One of the less obvious challenges of owning property in Costa Rica as a foreigner is staying on top of property bills and logistics. It can be confusing and difficult to navigate, which is why many international buyers hire property managers, even if they’re living there full-time.
With Second Street, that’s built into the trust structure. We partner with Secure Title, one of Latin America’s leading title companies, to serve as the trustee on your loan. By default, Secure Title handles property tax payments and property insurance—you just need to get them the funds and they’ll handle the rest. For buyers who want to be even more hands-off, Secure Title will manage utilities, internet, HOA fees, and other recurring expenses for an additional fee.
Second Street is the only international lender in Costa Rica with true institutional backing. We can guarantee that we will fund every loan we close, thanks to our backing from a publicly-listed U.S. mortgage REIT—actual institutional capital, committed in writing, that you can rely on. We're not putting your deposit at risk with volatile sources of capital, like credit lines with opaque, non-disclosed terms.
Since day one, Second Street has operated in full compliance with all applicable rules and regulations in both the U.S. and Costa Rica—including registration with SUGEF (Costa Rica’s financial regulatory authority). We built this company to operate at the highest standard of transparency from the start, because we knew that’s what this market was missing. Second Street is the only lender that offers the stability of fixed-rates with the reliability of institutional capital.
It’s why Second Street is the largest international mortgage lender in Costa Rica and why our clients close with confidence.
Tip: Ask any lender you’re considering where their capital comes from, how long they’ve been registered with SUGEF, and whether they’ve ever failed to fund a loan at closing. A pool of institutional capital isn’t a talking point—it ensures your lender actually shows up. Don’t accept slogans. Ask for specifics.
When you're buying property in Costa Rica as an American, the structure of your loan matters more than most buyers realize—not just for your monthly payment, but for your privacy, your day-to-day ownership experience, and potentially your path to residency.
Not all fideicomisos are created equal. Some lenders place shares of a corporation (rather than the property directly) into a trust. That structure can carry additional costs and potential tax liabilities—and may not support your residency goals. Second Street's loans are structured specifically to avoid these complications and to support residency applications, something most standard trust structures do not accommodate.
The right lender will be upfront about all of this. If you're ready to work with one, visit mysecondstreet.com to get started.
Not in practice. With both structures, you still live in, use, and rent out the property as your own. The main difference is how the title is held during the loan. With guarantee trust (fideicomiso), a trustee holds the title until the loan is fully repaid.
No. A guarantee trust (fideicomiso) in Costa Rica is the same as a deed of trust, a standard legal structure used in many parts of the United States. If you are from certain states, you may have already used one without realizing it. It serves the same purpose as a mortgage and is commonly referred to as a mortgage, despite the different structure.
The trust structure, known locally as a fideicomiso de garantía, fits within Costa Rican law and is widely used in real estate transactions. It allows lenders to structure loans in a way that works locally while still offering terms that feel familiar to American borrowers.
This is one of the most important questions you can ask. Start by asking where the money is coming from so you know your lender will show up at closing with cash. Complicated capital pipelines can put your deposit at risk, change loan terms and rates, or introduce new fees at closing, when it’s too late.
Second Street is the only reliable international lender in Costa Rica because we’re the only ones backed by institutional capital.
From there, verify that your lender is registered with SUGEF—Costa Rica's financial regulatory authority. All lenders operating in Costa Rica are required to be registered, so ask not just whether they are registered today, but how long they have been. A lender who obtained registration recently may not have been operating legally from the start.
Ask questions and expect clear answers. A trustworthy lender will explain exactly how your loan is structured, what the trust holds, and every fee involved—before you sign a purchase contract, not after. Be cautious of lenders who are vague about costs, show closing estimates that appear “too good to be true,” or introduce new fees late in the process. Transparency up front is a basic standard, not a bonus.
Pay attention to what a lender pushes you toward. If someone is steering you to a more expensive product—an adjustable-rate mortgage, a hard money loan, or a structure with fees that aren't fully explained—ask why. Others may try to convince you that you’re actually saving money, when really, you’re only saving the company money. You should fully understand what you are agreeing to before any contract is signed.
Find out if anyone involved in your transaction is being paid to refer you. Some lenders pay referral fees or incentivize applications in ways that may not always be visible to you. We don’t. At Second Street, we do not pay anyone to recommend us, which means the advice you receive along the way isn’t influenced by a financial incentive.
If residency is part of your plan, ask about it directly. How a loan is structured can affect your path to residency in ways that are not always obvious, and not every lender will offer to bring it up on their own.
No, and this is an important distinction. Not all fideicomisos (guarantee trusts) are set up the same way in Costa Rica. Some lenders place shares of a corporation—rather than the property itself—into a trust. While this may appear similar on the surface, it can result in additional costs, tax implications, and complications you would not face with a straightforward property trust.
How your trust is structured can also affect other aspects of your life in Costa Rica, including your path to residency. Before committing to a loan, ask your lender exactly what the trust holds and how it is set up. The details matter.
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