Home & Living

Owning a home here is a maintenance relationship with salt, sun and wind. Paint chalks, hardware corrodes, wood moves, pumps fail in September. Residents learn fast that the right supplier and the right trade are worth more than the right catalogue.

This section is for the unglamorous decisions that decide whether a house ages well: coatings, glass, shade, water, cabinetry, and the people who show up when something breaks.

What the coast does to a house

Salt does not care what anything cost. Within a year or two of the water it finds hinges, air conditioning coils, window tracks, outdoor kitchens, anything with a motor. The sun does the rest: sealants, cushions, paint and plastic all age here at a speed that surprises people who have owned houses elsewhere.

None of that is a reason not to live here. It is a reason to buy for maintenance rather than for the showroom, and to know who you will call before you need them. We wrote about that in how to protect a Cabo home from the coastal climate.

The question that matters more than price

Anybody will quote you in February. The trade worth keeping is the one who answers in August — when it is forty degrees, half the town has gone, and the job is small.

So when you are choosing between two quotes, ask how long they have been working here and who else they work for. Length of time in Los Cabos is the closest thing to a warranty this market offers, and the people who have it are rarely the cheapest on the first quote and almost always the cheapest by the third year.

What we will publish here

Builders, suppliers, trades and the services that keep a house standing — the ones residents pass between each other, with the practical detail attached: what they do, where they work, and how to reach the person who actually answers.