Although the town of Puerto Penasco (Rocky Point) still retains its charming fishing village ambiance, U.S. investors and local government alike are enthusiastically contributing to its blooming growth. Car rentals and cabs are readily available, and the town boasts an ever-increasing selection of restaurants, shops, and stores. The area is served by a modest, customs and immigration-ready airport (PPT) catering to light aircraft, with plans in the near future for scheduled service out of Phoenix and Tucson, as well as a $3 Million development project for Puerto Penasco's old seaport.
Travel and leisure magazine called Puerto Penasco one of the "Top five trips for the 21st Century." A well respected real estate consultant recently completed a market study indicating that Puerto Penasco is in the third year of a 25-year upward real estate cycle. To give you a tangible idea of what this growth has meant to property values already, According to a recent article in the Arizona Republic, "Two bedroom condos that were selling for $150,000.00 in 1999 are exceeding $300,000.00 today and the growth that's occurring in Puerto Penasco is out pacing Cancun, Puerto Vallarta, and Cabo san Lucas.
Sonoran Spa sold all 202 of their condos in a record time of just 16 months. Prices increased from $189,000.00 to $249,000.00 during that time.
Sonoran Sea sold out 208 condos, setting a new record, in 11 months. Prices went from $229,000.00 to $289,000.00.
Bella sirena sold 28 units in April 06 and in May 06 sold 21 units in a single day! Prices have risen on a typical two bedroom suite from $269,000.00 to $389,000.00 over an 18 month period.
On June 26th 06 The Sonoran Sun started sales of their first building with 114 suites. Existing owners were given first opportunity to purchase and they bought all 114 units in just a few hours. Prices of two bedroom condos ended at $349,000.00 for an average unit. On August 28th 06 the second building sold out in a similar manner.
, kicked into high
gear. Bunches of sunburned tourists rolled in, fresh from the beach, poring
over vendors' seashell necklaces and slipping into open-air cafes for fish
tacos and margaritas. It was a classic seaside resort town scene: casual,
small and quaint.
But peer west from the water's edge, toward Puerto Peñasco's extended
arm, Sandy Beach, and you see a starkly different vista taking shape: a
jagged wall of a dozen massive new condo-hotel resorts, in varying states
of construction, rising toward the sky like a new Cancún.
To the crowds of sun-loving tourists who are now flocking here from the
United States, the development is a welcome new addition to Puerto
Peñasco, or Rocky Point, as it's called in English. The town - blessed with a
surreal desert-meets-sea landscape, balmy year-round temperatures,
English-speaking expatriates and an intact Old Port fishing village - has lured
a mix of Arizona retirees and spring break revelers for years. Now, with its
growing crop of new restaurants and upscale resorts that please middle-
American tastes and budgets, Rocky Point is a draw to more vacationers.
"Every week, there are more visitors," said Germán Palacio Jiménez, who
runs the Point, Malecón Fundadores, 200, (entrées $10 to $14; all prices are
in dollars), a year-old waterfront seafood spot. "We've had customers from
Colorado, New Mexico - even New York." Other new places offer
everything from Mexican fusion to the European cafe fare of Coffee's Haus,
Boulevard Benito Juárez, 216B; (52-638) 388-1065. The most expensive
meal is $7.
Although the narrow beaches here are coarse and beige - more like New
Jersey than the Yucatán - this is the closest shoreline to Arizona, just 225
miles from Phoenix. And the town, an hour south of the border, is in
Mexico's free zone so tourists from the United States need no special
permits.
"This place is like the next San Diego, but with bigger bang for your buck,"
said Mike Callaway, 48, a government employee from Tucson. He was
sipping a Corona on a recent afternoon at the Sonoran Sun, where he paid
$230 a night for his suite. The property is one of three new luxury Sonoran
Resorts on Sandy Beach that are also hotels.
Real estate prices are still affordable compared with those of other beach
resorts, making it relatively easy to snag a beachfront condo. The Sun's
rental manager, Roberto García, said that the 228 units sold out in seven
hours last summer at an average of $300,000 each. That's the typical price
for a waterfront condo, with annual appreciation rates of about 25 percent
in the last two years, said Brad Henderson, sales manager for Coldwell
Banker.
Meanwhile, plans for Puerto Peñasco and its surrounding deserts continue
to expand. There are more than 40 large-scale developments in construction
or expansion, plus three new golf courses and six more due.
A small airport for charter flights now offered by Westwind Air Service
(each flight is priced separately) reopened in September after a $2.5 million
renovation; an international airport has a projected opening date of 2008.
Also being built is a scenic coastal highway that will link Puerto Peñasco
with cities to the north and south.