move to Belize<\/a> and have never come here. I don’t know how they do that. Curtis did it. He moved. He’d never been here, and I would never have done that in a million years. He just trusted me.<\/span><\/p>\nCurtis Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> The only reason I moved without coming first is because of the way Cindy is. She did her due diligence. She’s a world traveler, and I put my trust and faith in her. If she would’ve said, “I’ve only been there once,” or “I don’t know that much about it,” then no.<\/span><\/p>\nCharlotte Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> Your trust is the sign of a strong relationship. Now, what about living in a single-family home rather than a condo. What’s your yard work like? What’s the upkeep? Do you have someone that cleans it? Or do you do it?<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> Oh, no. Curtis used to.<\/span><\/p>\nCharlotte Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> Your yard is beautifully maintained.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> Curtis used to do it. And then he injured his neck. We were trying to get all the seagrass. He was trying to pull a cart. He injured his neck and limited what he was able to do. He still has a fetish over any leaf that’s cutting off the palm tree. He’s also not allowed on the ladder because he would be up on the ladder, on the top rung\u2014this is a man who wouldn’t get on a ladder until we came here. He was afraid of heights. Now he’s on the top ladder, with no hands with a pole trying to get coconuts.<\/span><\/p>\nCharlotte Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> Did he tell you he was on the top floor of the new building at the Grand Baymen?<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> Yes. He showed me the video from the roof. Curtis is a changed human. He was on multiple anxiety medications before we moved. And now, he’s a changed human being.<\/span><\/p>\nCharlotte Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> Incredible.<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> That’s what it does for you when you don’t have to worry. And even with COVID, I’m more paranoid than him. We have a casita here. Now, it’s for our live-in caretaker. Expats think we need people to take care of us all the time while we are here. We didn’t have that in the States. Why would I want it full-time here? We have a housekeeper that comes once a week, cleans the house, does all the windows whatever you want.<\/span><\/p>\nWe have a house yardman, a handyman that comes once a week and he does everything else. He does a beautiful job. All that rock work out there, he did it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nWe’ve been with the people that have helped us because we hear horror stories of other people. And we pay Belizean prices. The other people are not doing that either. It’s like they’re getting ripped. But I just leave it alone. I figure, if a Belizean can convince them, that’s fine. They have the money. That’s fine. We have someone that helps us because we’re on rain catch, too.<\/span><\/p>\nI didn’t even know about these things because we have a septic tank. We never had a septic tank before. We’re on rain catch, and I hooked up the water. It’s all water that’s collected for us. You have your pump to bring it into the house and things like that. I still don’t know where the water is. It’s under the house somewhere.<\/span><\/p>\nCharlotte Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> You use that for showering and washing dishes, and all that?<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> Yes, everything except for drinking.<\/span><\/p>\nCharlotte Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> Excellent.<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> Everything. We’d stick chlorine in it just because I didn’t like the smell.<\/span><\/p>\nCurtis Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> It runs the whole length of the house.<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> It’s huge.<\/span> We used to check it all the time because I was paranoid and the water has never gone down. I never used to water the plants. Now I water the plants. I do everything with the water. We’ve never had any issues.<\/span><\/p>\nCharlotte Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> Fascinating.<\/span><\/p>\nCurtis Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> You were asking about the yard. Seventy to 80% of those plants and flowers out there, that’s Cindy’s. She’s out there working in the yard every day.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> It was a jungle back there. Curtis had to cut it. He cut down around 20 trees and did that trying to get it to not be a jungle.<\/span><\/p>\nCurtis Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> I’m going all the time with Cindy\u2019s yard. She said, “I\u2019ve got to get more flowers. I\u2019ve got to get more cement.” Did you see those shells that went down? She\u2019s fascinated with conch shells. We went up all the way north, and I was collecting all these shells for her.<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> And now I’m talking to a fisherman who throws them away or back into the water and let me have them instead of having to do that. I’m hoping that works out.<\/span><\/p>\nDarryl Tweed<\/strong>: <\/span> If you don’t mind, may I ask how much it costs for your caretaker and housekeeper?<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans:<\/strong> It’s 75 Belize for the caretaker, and I pay 90 to the housekeeper because it’s two people.<\/span><\/p>\nDarryl Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> Okay.<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> They come, and it’s a shorter time period that they’re invasive to the house. Our expenses without the house payment, and that’s having $500\u2014this is Belizean dollars\u2014$500 Belizean for entertainment and things like that. Is it only $4,000 a month?<\/span><\/p>\nCurtis Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> That’s 4,000 Belize. That’s 2,000 U.S. That includes going out to eat, buying what food you want, and having dentist and medical\u2014not the $28 bag of chips.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nCharlotte Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> For the housekeeper and the caretaker, is that per time they come in person?<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> Yes, per time they come. It works out to 200 U.S. dollars a month to have a housekeeper. $150 a month to have a great yard guy that spends eight hours here.<\/span><\/p>\nDarryl Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> I’ve heard stories, as you said, the expats come down and inflate the prices. Instead of paying them $200 they want to pay them $600 or $700 for that same service. And that ruins the way of life.<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> There are enough people here that need their work. We just tell them no to inflated prices. They expect higher wages. We say, “No. This is what you will make. This is what an average person makes.” Yes, we pay a little more, I mean, the contract people who do cement work at 45 Belize a day. During the construction, I told the guy, “No, no, no. We’re paying $60 a day minimum.” I know how much they have to eat. It costs them $20 at least to eat a day. So, no. I don’t want to be that person inflating the prices. I don’t want the people on my property to feel they’re being abused either.<\/span><\/p>\nCharlotte Tweed<\/strong>:<\/span> Right.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nCindy Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> But even still, I’ve built properties. It’s so cheap on that end of the spectrum. You just go wooh! Other than getting materials here from the U.S., that’s when you have to pay a lot.<\/span><\/p>\nCurtis Evans<\/strong>:<\/span> We went through several different housekeepers and other people because of differences. Again, some of them didn’t show up for work or something happened.<\/span><\/p>\n