All Forum Posts by: Jonathan Hankins

@Account Closed

Let me ask you a question: Is it fair to me or to the readers to take my words out of context by omitting to quote part of the paragraph that I wrote?

For the record, this is what I wrote in its entirety, as everybody can see above:

"As pretty much everybody knows, Mexico sadly has an issue with drug/cartel related crime, that has been going on forever. In spite of that, more and more foreigners visit, move to, invest and buy real estate Mexico year after year. Why? Because nothing bad happens to 99.99% of them and they feel safe. So they keep coming back in ever greater numbers.

Many people actually feel safer traveling to Mexico than to the US. In the US, they can be randomly shot at a supermarket, a school or a nightclub. In Mexico, that won't happen; you'll be shot if you get involved in the drug business, which most people won't do. Sometimes (rarely), people will accidentally get shot in the crossfire between gangs like a few days ago in Tulum but that type of incident occur pretty much everywhere but you just don't hear about it. When it happens to tourists in Mexico, the press is having a field that with it. Savvy visitors to Mexico avoid certain areas and taking part in certain activities, like they would actually do anywhere."

What is mentioned in that article is very sad but these are local people linked to drug activities, with sadly some innocent (overwhelmingly) local victims as collateral but the shootings rarely happen in the places where tourists go. Countries like the US and Canada have travel advices letting you where not to go (and what not to do).

If you want to succumb to media sensationalism and headlines meant to sell, be my guest. However, for the purpose of a healthy and helpful discussion, I invite you to the the do the following exercise to get the facts first:

1. Check Mexico's tourism statistics. They will confirm to you that the number has been steadily increasing year after year (Covid or recession effects aside). They will also give you the current yearly number of visitors.

2. Find out how many visitors have disappeared or been shot in Mexico over the last few years. You'll find articles for every single death. You can bet on that.

3. Divide the number of visitors who disappeared or were shot over the last twelve months by the number of actual visitors. The result will be even way less than 0.01%, which corresponds to the 99.99% I mentioned in my previous post. But don't take my word for it; do the calculations for yourself;

4. Find out how many people died from a random shooting in the US over the last 12 months. Compare it to the number of visitors who were shot or disappeared in Mexico. You'll find out that the number of victims in the US is way higher.

If you don't trust official figures 100%, you might want to complete your research by getting some anecdotal evidence. Go to the closest airport. Check out the first arriving plane from Mexico and ask people such questions as: How was your trip? Did you feel safe? Would you go back? Alternatively, you might want to travel to Mexico and check for yourself on the ground. And, who knows, maybe, like many before you, you'll decide to buy real estate there during your trip. :)

Finally, I completely agree with you that this cartel-related violence is sad. Because of the stigma of it, many people won't want to buy real estate there. And that's all good. This means more opportunities for the investors who can see the forest from the trees and it also means that I don't need to participate in a bidding war when I want to but a property there.