- For foreign buyers in Medellín
- Built with local realtors
- Updated this quarter
Here's 99% of what you need to know before buying in Medellín.
The 12 documents we wish we had before buying in Medellín. What each barrio costs, what it earns now that the short let boom has cooled, how long it takes to sell again. Plus the things nobody writes down: how far below asking to go, and what a yield projection is actually worth.
The 12 documents to make a good real estate investment in Medellín in 2026
A lot of people bought here on a projected twelve percent that the market no longer pays, and the same forty square metre studio is now for sale in twenty towers at once. These documents show you what is actually being earned and paid. They are put together with realtors, notaría staff and owners we work with in the city.
Questions
Do you list your sources?
Yes, on every table. Each one says where the figures came from and the month they were collected: the property registry, published notaría rates, listing and nightly rate histories we track ourselves, building accounts shared with us by owners, and what the agents we work with in each barrio are seeing week to week. Anything that is an estimate rather than a recorded number is labelled as one.
Is the short let business here finished?
No, but it is nothing like what was being sold in 2022. Supply went up faster than visitors did, rates came down, and a good number of buildings have voted the practice out at an owners' assembly. What a specific building allows now matters more than the barrio it is in, and that is what the tables are built around.
Can a foreigner actually own property here?
Yes, in your own name, with the same rights as a Colombian and no trust or special permit involved. The part that catches people out is on the way in: money brought into the country has to be registered with the central bank, and if it is not, taking it back out when you sell becomes a problem. Document 07 covers how that is done.
Are the prices in pesos or dollars?
Pesos, because that is how the market quotes and negotiates. Every table also carries a dollar column with the rate and the date we used, which matters more here than people expect: two buyers who paid the same peso price two years apart have made very different returns in their own currency.
What is an estrato and does it matter to me?
It is a number from one to six attached to the address, and it decides what you pay for water, power and gas, and it feeds into your property tax. Two similar flats in different estratos have very different running costs, which is why it appears in most of these documents.
How long are the documents?
One to four pages each. They are tables and checklists rather than reports, so any one of them takes about ten minutes to read.
Which areas do you cover?
Eighteen barrios: Provenza, Manila, Astorga, Castropol, Los Balsos, El Tesoro, San Lucas, Ciudad del Río, Conquistadores, Estadio, El Velódromo, La Floresta, Suramericana, Belén Rosales, La América, Zúñiga, Envigado centro and Sabaneta. If you need somewhere or a specific project that is not in there, write to us and we will put it together for you at no extra cost.
I have a question about my own situation.
Ask us. If the answer is in the research we already have, we will send it. If it needs a call to someone in that barrio or a look at a specific building, we will do that too and come back to you, at no extra cost.
Is $49 a lot for a set of documents?
You are about to spend a few hundred thousand dollars on a property, in a country whose paperwork you did not grow up with. A return that was never real, a building that will not allow what you bought it for, money you cannot repatriate: there are plenty of ways this gets expensive. We have done the homework so that you do not have to.
What format are they in?
PDF, so you can read them on your phone, tablet or computer.
When do I get them?
Straight after payment. The download link appears on screen and a copy arrives by email.
How often are they updated?
Every quarter. Our contacts in Medellín re-check the numbers before each release, so the version you download today is the one updated this quarter.
I have another question.
Ask us on the contact page and we will get back to you.
Three packs
The first pack has 4 documents, the second has 6, and the third has all 12 of our Medellín research.
All the data and information in these documents was checked this year with agents, notaría staff and owners working in Medellín.