I hear that people still occasionally come to Ecuador in search of the same deals, which unfortunately may ave since vanished.A house like ours(2000 sq. ft. in a gated community)will cost about $50-60,000 today.

Other prices have also risen.Certainly Ecuador is still relatively cheap I believe it has now mostly lost its cost advantage over other Central and South American countries.

There are two related problems facing anyone who wants to reside in Ecuador. The first is language. It is necessary to learn Spanish. A working knowledge of Spanish will help you beat overcharges in business dealings.

The second is wealth. All my life I was middle-class in the US, but today in Ecuador, I'm fabulously wealthy. And that makes me a target, not only of thieves, but of virtually everyone I do business with.  Already downtown Quito is dangerous for tourists at night, and South Quito is dangerous by day as well.

With those caveats out of the way, let's talk about why I still love this place.Outside my bedroom window are bucolic fields stretching up the distant mountainsides.Cattle and horses graze across the rushing river, whose sounds lull my wife and me to sleep each night.

We usually keep our window open because it's so peaceful, and nighttime temperatures are only in the 50s. By day, the sun usually comes up very bright in a clear blue sky, then as the morning wears on, clouds begin to form, perhaps with the promise of afternoon showers.

Let's return to real estate. This is a very difficult transaction because it's so time consuming and it's very hard to keep the seller from raising the price when he sees a "gringo" involved. Also, there is no multiple listing service here, and most properties sell by word of mouth.  Even the best agents have only a couple of dozen properties for sale. Since we bought in December of 1999, real estate prices have risen dramatically.  A builder on our street expects to complete 4 houses very similar to ours within the next few weeks - price: $60,000. There is construction going on almost everywhere in my district. In the more upscale Cumbaya Valley, a new 2500 square-foot house is selling for $125,000. The "all cash" price might be as low as $110,000.

Personally, I cannot recommend highly enough the purchase of an apartment in a high-rise, or the purchase of a single home in a conjunto, which is a type of gated community. The primary reason is the security this type of living will provide. An apartment building will have a 24-hour guard who knows everyone who lives there.

Any community fees are shared among the owners. The same is true for the conjunto -- ours has only 6 families, so our fees, when divided 6 ways, are still about $45 per month.  In a larger conjunto, the monthly fees should be accordingly less. Recently I made what I believe to be a super find, right in my own neighborhood.