Hello we are in Las Terrenas at Big Dans Polar Bar ,we are going to find out all about Dan and Big Dans Polar Bar, .Yeh, so this is really good cause I don’t know you that well either so, tell me how long have you been here?
DAN : Just a little over 5 years
A little over 5 years, ok and what brought you Las Terrenas?
I was a realtor broker in Florida, south west Florida and struggling in a big office and the agency wasn’t making any money so I was looking for a place to go sell real estate. I started researching checking around different areas all over the world really I looked at a lot of places and a lot of things kept bringing me back to the DR partially because it’s only 2 hours from Miaimi. I ended up going to the national association of realtors convention in New Orleans, it was October of 2006 and I ended up spending 5 days in the international pavilion there and everything kept drawing me back to the DR, the DR, the DR the more I would say DR the more it was the Samana peninsula .,so the promises of the infrastructure the new road that they were just getting on the way the new airports and so on and so forth and the water treatment facilities and all this kind of stuff that were coming on..I figured well gosh if I want to be able to sell some real estate there you know so I started to making trips here in February 2006,. I started out I went to Punta Cana first ,stayed at Capa Can?a for three days there got treated like royalty there then I flew to Puerto Plata and I rented a car and just started driving along the north coast but intending to come here to Samana Peninsula. I came here met a friend, we had a mutual friend in the united states, he said if you’re gonna go there you gotta meat this guy MONCI, go meat MONCI actually he’s Cuban, he bought here 30 years ago or something out in Bonita beach a place called the white house I think it is, casa blanca, I don’t remember anyway, he introduced me to some other people .
You kept going back to the DR everything was pointing you back to the DR and so you came to Las Terrenas? And met this Cuban ,what was his name? MONCI
He’s the guy like I said he bought some property here on Bonita beach and built a hotel there 20 years ago 30 years ago something like that he knew a lot of people he introduced me to some people and then I started making trips I came probably 6 or 8 times between February and July of 2007 .In July I just stayed, I figured I could do it .
You came here with the intention of just selling real estate ?
Right and I did that for the first year, year and a half and did alright but then I think it was just the world economy basically everything just slowed down and that.. so I didn’t want to leave so I opened up BIG DANS.
Imidiatly, so you’ve had Big DANS for 5 years ?
No for 3 and a half, always in Las Terrenas .
To recap you stared in real estate here but economy was bad and you ended up opening a caffe a bar.
I had about for years experience in restaurants . I was trying to walk away from restaurants .
Ok, so you have a lot of experience in restaurants not only in real estate, so when you came here and realized that the real estate wasn’t going well you decided back to my roots . So, what could you tell us a little bit about the experience you had has an American moving to Las Terrenas in specific with the Dominacn culture ,the people, and also in opening your activity any positive ,negative experiences you’ve had .
It was easy, really it was I mean they pretty much welcome you with open arms .They want your money here of course so that helps a whole lot and of course the language thing is a challenge you know espesialy I was 55 at the time 54 at the time, whatever it’s a little bit hharder you know but if you work at it you pick it up and it does help to know it ,it does help a whole lot. Basicly, when I opend my business I put out a sign . I mean really and truly I didn’t have to go through all the health inspections and taxes and permits and licences and all that .I opend up a restaurant, I think I put about 6 .000 $ into it that’s equipment and everything and 3 and a half years later we’re still doing it.
This allows you to live here? fantastic So, that’s very positive, I’m sure that that’s a good story . It’s true that one of the fundamentals of being here is that the Dominican people do welcome foreigners. Of course there’s the money factor but their culture is also, they’re very warm and welcoming . So you haven’t had really negative experience here with running your business ?
Not really,no I mean when you weigh it all out my god it’s incredible.
You would do this again ?
I would do it again in a heart beat .Nothings perfect of course you have your problems in America you have your problems here and things like that but it’s so much easier then you got the DR to be able to live in while you’re doing that . It’s just a freer lifestyle ,beautiful beaches and how green it is and the mountains right here .
You would suggest this to any friend or American citizen that would think of moving ?
I have
I’m sure you have. And you had probably a following of friends .
I had a lot of people come down and visit . It’s not easy for a lot of people . Leaving the family was the hardest part ,but my daughter and granddaughter will be here next month ,so like I said it’s only 2 hours from Maiami . You’ve got the new flights coming in from New York now at El CATEY.
I had a big office in Fort Myers I had a dozen agents working for me I’ve got thousands of dollars a month going out for all this crap and not making any money . So, again I started researching and I mean I was into my job and into my business I belonged to several real estate associations and clubs and stuff in the united states. I’d go to these meetings and we’d hear stuff from all over the people talking from all over the place.
So my mind starts whirling, you know well there probably is other places that you could sell real eastate and so I started spending hours online checking all these things out and listening to these people at these meetings ,stuff like that. I was looking, I even looked in Greece and a lot of places. South America and the DR kept coming up a couple times and so that sounds pretty good, that sounds pretty good, they have fee simple tilte that’s the same as we have in the united states , its just where you own your land you know, in a lot of places you have to get a corporation and do all this kind of stuff and Americans I think we have a hard time with that.
Yeh, it would be uncomfortable a little bit maybe you have somebody else on your corporation you know and stuff like that. So, that was attractive you know and then like I said I went to the real estate convention in New Orleans , it was right after Caterina and so we were like the first convention I remember that it was cool. But there were all these classes that you’re supposed to schedule to go learn how to do your job better and things like that .
I just kept going back to the international venue and visiting all these places you know ,Panama and all these different places that you can look at to sell real estate and again I ran into this woman who was selling for Cap Cana, you know Cap Cana is a beautiful Jack Nicholas golf course over by Punta Cana and bran new just opening and all that kind of stuff and somehow I wrangled myself an invite to go down .
We became friends a little bit we were through with the convention , we were there seeing each other in the different booths there every day and a bunch of us went out to dinner . She invited us to go see the property, that was her job too . The rest of it is just history there, because once I was here it was just so attractive and you could just feel the energy . First time I came over the hill from Sanchez I got behind 25 dump trucks I couldn’t believe it ,I said man something’s happening here you know , this place is coming up.
So, we inched our way up the mountain and down the mountain and then Las Terrenas , Las Ballenas out there in front of you . It does exactly speak for it self. I wanted to spend more time here , then all those times in between that I was coming here I’d book a 10 day stay or something like that .Then immidiatly I’d get down to about 3 days and I was calling the airline, give me another couple days .
Then one time I think I stayed 20 days , I said ,could I live here? Could I live here? You know, I wanted to see so I stayed 20 days and the answer was yes. It was clear so I started making arrangements ,started closing everything out back home , told my family and moved down here, I don’t know I think it was the first of July or something like that/. On my first visit here after we left, after we flew from Cap Cana to Puerto Plata and I started driving along the first thing I do ,I go to Cabarete and I’m driving to Caberete and I’m looking for places that I might be able to sell you know I’m looking ,I look at this place It’s “Cabarete East”that looks nice that looks nice > So, I park the car and I go in there and I start asking around for who built this and stuff ,it on had been finished out maybe like a couple months or something like that ,no it was actually an apartment complex 40 apartments and nobody was there, none of the owners were there ,I said oh well this is the best trip I’ve made.
I left my business card with the bar tender there they had a little bar right on the beach there and I left my business card there about a week later I get a call from a gut, I was already planning my second trip down so back to Puerto Plata I come and we all get to know each other and get to be friends we all have the same interests and things like that. They’re from Washington DC Americans.
I’m looking for investments you know and I’m selling of course and we hooked up with some people that wanted to sell some property out in Las Galleras and we ended up buying, long story short we ended up buying 54 acres right on the ocean , just this side of Las Galleras just property exactly right and it’s still sitting there waiting on some time to develop it and some ,actually we’re trying to sew up some land around it to do maybe a golf course or something like that .
AND SO THAT EXPERIENCE ,THAT TRANSACTION, TRANSITION,WHAT I WANT TO SAY THE TRANSACTION OF BUYING THE LAND AND ALL OF THAT .
Yah, I sold shares in that when I went back to the united states and I sold shares in that 54 acres and so I knew I could sell real estate then by that time I knew .
You bought for yourself personally and then you were able to sell as well and that was all good and easy fantastic> Is there any other story you would like to share that you could think of ,or no .
It’s just every day sights that you see here are so different and fresh and strange and exotic and sexy and you know all that kind of stuff .I saw 4 guys playing backgammon ,this was the weirdest one I’d ever seen cause, 2 guys are sitting ,one guy is standing and playing and one guy is standing and he’s got a concrete block hanging off of his shoulder on a rope like this you know and they’re slamming those towels down and everything and I’m like what the heck is going on here so come to find out that I talked to them a little bit, come to find out the guy that was standing was the second guy ,no, the guy standing with the block was the first guy out the previous game so he had to play the whole next game with that block ,that was how they gambled or whatever it was hilarious but there’s something like that every day you see something like that something different ,kids rolling hoops down the road .I tell my mom it’s ,sometimes it feels like it’s living back in the 60 in America you know the family and stuff.
It’s really nice. So we’ve concluded our interview with Dan and I think we found out a lot more about Las Terrenas and the Dominican Republic through your story telling, and do you want to say goodbuy to whoever is watching us .
Ya, hi mom good buy everybody hope you come and see us hope you come to Big Dans Polar Bar in Las Terrenas. I didn’t have to do that since 19…….