About Colombia Desk

Colombia Desk is a guide and a hands-on concierge for foreigners who want to buy property in, move to or plan a trip to Medellín or Bogotá. At Colombia Desk, we write the guides for people weighing a big decision from abroad, and we offer to do the work with them on the ground.

Our readers are usually Americans or Europeans weighing one of three plans. Some want an apartment to live in part of the year or rent out. Others are moving for retirement or remote work, or planning a group trip, wedding or family holiday. They have read forum threads and listing sites. They want the process, the real costs and the trade-offs laid out plainly, by someone on their side of the table.

What We Do

We do two jobs. The guides explain how things work in Colombia, and the concierge does them with you.

The guides cover four subjects: how buying property works, what each neighborhood is like to live in, the visa routes, and how to plan a stay. The buying guides follow a purchase from the promesa de compraventa and the title study to the deed, the registry and the foreign-investment record. Each one is written for a reader who has never done it in Colombia before.

The concierge has three services:

• A buyer’s concierge in Medellín and Bogotá, from the shortlist and viewings to the lawyer, the title study, the notary and the keys.
• A relocation concierge for people moving here: the neighborhood, the first rental, the visa paperwork with a lawyer, the cédula appointment, the bank and the phone.
• A group trip concierge that books the villa, the transport, the tables and the day trips, and stays reachable while you are here.

Who We Work For

Our concierge works for the buyer, the mover or the group, and never for a seller. On a purchase, every offer, document and payment goes to you for approval before it goes anywhere else.

We do not publish a fee. A remote purchase with a visa attached asks far more of us than a long weekend for six. So we reply to each request with how we would help and what it involves.

You decide from there. Start on the contact form.

How We Write the Guides

Every figure on the site carries its source and the date it applies to. Minimum wages, visa minimums, notary tariffs and tax rates come from the official text where one exists.

The official texts we use are the resolutions of Cancillería and the tariffs of the Superintendencia de Notariado y Registro. For tax and foreign investment, we use the rulings of DIAN and the circulars of Banco de la República. Where only a law firm or a listing portal publishes a figure, we name it as the source.

We keep one shared list of facts for the whole site, so the 2026 investor visa minimum reads 612,816,750 Colombian pesos (COP) on every page that mentions it. When a figure is in doubt, such as a rate that two sources state differently, we say so on the page or leave the number out.

Figures expire. The minimum wage changes every January and moves every visa minimum with it, notary and registry tariffs were last reset in February 2026, and the exchange rate moves daily. The free tools read their rates from one file, so a change to a tariff updates every calculator at once.

When to Bring in a Lawyer

The guides explain the rules. They do not replace a professional who has read your documents.

Bring in a Colombian lawyer in four cases:

• before you sign a promesa de compraventa
• for any title study
• for a visa application with an unusual fact in it
• whenever a property is co-owned or held by a company

Use a Colombian accountant for tax returns on rental income or a sale. The real estate lawyer guide explains what a lawyer does on a purchase.

If something on a page is wrong or out of date, tell us on the contact form and we will check it against the source.