With all the beautiful photos and rankings as one of the world's best cities, it's easy to fall in love with the idea of living in San Miguel.
But online research won't answer the question that matters most.
It's easy to be lonely in paradise.
People fall hard here. I know many people who've bought a house on their third day. I don't recommend marrying someone you met on Tuesday either.
For more than 35 years, I've helped people find their people. Today I created Live Before You Decide, a two to four week program that helps you discover whether San Miguel should become your next chapter.
If it does, my team and I help you build your life here.
If you decide San Miguel is simply a great place to visit, that's perfect too.
“The best way to decide if San Miguel is home is to first find your people.”
People thought we were crazy. We had wonderful lives and homes in the Berkshires, Manhattan, and Boca Raton. We didn't speak a word of Spanish. Why would we move to San Miguel?
We arrived for a month to explore if we wanted to live here. On our first day our Airbnb host introduced us to Audrey, and she said:
The best way to decide if San Miguel is home is to first find your people.
She welcomed us into the Jewish community, organized dinner parties for us, connected us with bridge players, local philanthropists, and families who would sponsor us for the golf club. When we asked, she introduced us to a realtor she trusted.
After we bought a house and said we're all in, her partner Jorge helped us find our doctors and scheduled meetings with a visa specialist, a tax advisor, and every trusted local professional we needed.
Looking back, Audrey and Jorge accomplished in four weeks what would have taken us four years.
We're thrilled San Miguel is our next chapter.
Carol & Marvin · Boca Raton, Florida
Book a Free Discovery CallSometimes San Miguel is a wonderful place to visit. Sometimes it's where you spend three months a year. Sometimes it's the rest of your life.
Start wherever you actually are.
Experience everyday life in San Miguel through a program designed around you. Meet people who share your interests, explore neighborhoods, and find out what your life here could actually look like.
Learn More →Stay in one of my homes while experiencing San Miguel like a local, not a tourist.
Learn More →Planned a trip and want to make the magic intentional rather than leaving it to chance? Whether or not you stay with me, I'll design a personalized itinerary built around your interests, introducing you to the people, places, and experiences you live for.
Learn More →Once you've said yes to San Miguel, whether for the winter or for good, Jorge Catalán and I help you navigate the practical side of relocating through trusted introductions, local expertise, and ongoing support.
Learn More →Maybe you bought a house last month and nobody told you how any of it works.
Or maybe you sorted all of that yourself, and what you're actually missing is people. Friends your age and stage of life. Someone who calls and invites you to private, cool events.
Jorge handles the practical. I handle the people. We're here to help you with one or both.
Learn More →“We'd visited for years. This was the first time we could picture living here.”
We'd been flirting with the idea of leaving our beautiful home in Los Angeles for years, but every visit felt like a vacation.
This time was different.
Audrey introduced us to people we know will become lifelong friends, hosted wonderful dinner parties, connected us with experts we completely trust, and helped us experience what everyday life here could actually look like.
Moving to another country is scary. Knowing Audrey and Jorge are here makes us feel like we already have family waiting for us.
Dean & Cheryl Radesky · Los Angeles, California
Finally, with my youngest of three sons grown, I came for two weeks last spring. Within a few days I knew two weeks wasn't enough.
So I posted a photo of myself in a San Miguel Facebook group holding two challahs and asked whether anyone had a house I could rent where I could host Friday night dinners for 12 people.
I wasn't looking for a house. I was looking for a table.
The perfect person answered. (A dinnerware designer!) I stayed at her home six weeks that summer. In the fall I came back for good.
Two weeks in the spring. Six weeks in the summer. Forever in the fall.
Even after 35 years of helping other people build relationships and communities, it was hard for me. What made it possible were the angels who took me under their wing. They introduced me to the right people and made me feel like I belonged here.
I wanted to pay that forward.
That's why I created Casa Avra.
Before San Miguel, I was a wealth advisor at Bernstein Private Wealth Management and a founding partner of a global venture capital platform. I spent 20 years helping people make large decisions with money carefully. That's still the job. The stakes just look different now.
Today I'm also the founder of Love in San Miguel, the city's premier bilingual, bicultural singles community, where I keep doing what I've always loved most.
Almost everyone offering relocation help here came from the US or Canada, which means you're hiring a foreigner to teach you how to live in a country they're also still learning. I know what it's like to arrive. Jorge has known how this country works his whole life.
He founded NaturaSMA, this city's first organic grocery store, co-founded Mercado Sano, and has spent 23 years here. He's also the reason our clients stop worrying about healthcare. He finds their providers, schedules the appointments, comes with them, translates in the room, and delivers their prescriptions to the door.
I help you find your people. Jorge helps you live well.
“Every appointment was scheduled. Every follow-up happened. Every detail was handled. We can't imagine making this move without Jorge.”
Jim & Ilene · Portland, Oregon
When retirement expert Ari Taublieb came to San Miguel, he came to answer his clients' question. Can I really build a life here?
He came to Casa Avra, and to my community, to find out. His visit wasn't sponsored or scripted. It was an honest and often hilarious look at everyday life here.
Watch Ari's Visit on YouTube →My TEDx talk, “How to Be a Matchmaker in Work, Life and Love,” has nearly 200,000 views and explains my approach to life and my passion for making introductions.
Finding your people has always been my raison d'être. Of course I'm doing it here, in my forever adopted home.
Watch Audrey's TEDx Talk →You didn't study sculpture, because you couldn't make a living as an artist. You stopped dancing when the kids came. You always meant to write the book.
San Miguel is full of people who finally did.
Yoga, Pilates, tai chi, a gym with a trainer who becomes a friend. Pickleball, golf, tennis, horseback riding, hiking. Dance: salsa, belly dance and tango, classes almost every day. Walking groups that meet three mornings a week, including the mural walks where you learn the city one painted wall at a time.
Painting, sculpture, ceramics, jewelry, photography. Studios and teachers everywhere, and nobody cares that you've never done it before.
Writing groups, book clubs, Spanish classes, lectures at the Biblioteca most days of the week. Three operas in a town of 174,000 people.
Men's groups and women's groups. The Jewish community. Unitarian Church. Rotary Club. Bridge. 110 nonprofits that would be glad to have you participate.
San Miguel has three operas and no ballet, yet. A client told me she cared about dance, and I introduced her to the people trying to change that. There are foundations here, boards that need people, organic vineyards that will let you into the cellar with the winemakers, and a town that has been welcoming people with ideas since the 1940s. If you want to start something, this is still a place where you can.
Whatever it is, I'll introduce you to the people who will welcome your creativity and enthusiasm.
Because finding the right house matters.
Finding your tribe is what makes it home.
“Audrey made it OK to say no.”
I'd been thinking about retiring in San Miguel for years.
Audrey found me a wonderful Spanish school, introduced me to women's groups, showed me where to play pickleball, and invited me to her Love in San Miguel events where I met some great men.
Walking through town with Audrey is like walking with a celebrity. She seems to know everyone, and she kept introducing me to people she thought I'd like.
I love San Miguel, but I realized the altitude and dry climate weren't good for me.
Audrey never tried to convince me otherwise. She helped me get the clarity I came for. She made it OK to say no.
Wherever I explore to retire next, I hope I find someone like Audrey.
Annie · Los Angeles, California
I'm not one of them. I'm not licensed, I don't list homes, and I don't show homes.
San Miguel has been attracting foreign money since the 1940s. Most of the people you'll meet here are wonderful. Some are counting on you not knowing what things cost.
My clients used to call me their financial bodyguard when I was a wealth advisor. The role hasn't really changed.
I don't need you to move here. I don't need you to buy anything.
I need you to make the right decision, and sometimes the right decision is no.
I'm the friend in San Miguel you wish you already had.
Whether you're wondering where to live, who you'll meet, or whether San Miguel is really the right fit, let's talk about it.
Twenty minutes. No pressure. Just a conversation about the life you're hoping to build and whether Casa Avra is the right fit for you.
Book Your Free 20-Minute Discovery Call