Originally Posted by
coolcoil
Are the taxes comparable? Colombian airport, resident exit, and sales taxes typically add $150 or more on top of the fare for my flights.
You may also want to look at booking through UA even though you have had issues with them. For my two trips this month, booking a UA ticket on all-COPA metal saved $200 on each trip (MDE-IAD and MDE-IAD/JFK-MDE). I have no idea why UA would have COPA inventory cheaper than COPA, but sometimes it happens.
I have, in fact, noticed that on MDE-MCO comparisons. It will still cost me about $200 more to take that trip from MDE than it currently does from SJO, but that's a lot better than double.
It's entirely possible that I will get some of that money back, albeit not much. With the type of visa I will have, I may not be considered a Colombian resident, but a foreign worker. If that's the case, I will be able to continue to get a refund of my Colombian Residents Tax with the stamp at departure.
It is quite understandable that flights out of MDE would cost more, actually. SJO is a heavy tourist destination, and MDE isn't there (yet). Whether or not it will get there in my lifetime is yet to be seen. All things considered, however, paying higher airfare is far offset by the overall lower cost of living and doing business in Colombia vs. Costa Rica, IMHO. Not to mention the better infrastructure and lower intrusion of bureaucracy.