What we check before a property goes on our site

Before a property goes on our site, we check the developer's background and we visit the property. Our listing data then goes through a set of checks, for example that a home marked sold is not featured and that prices are set so the listing appears in search. None of that replaces your own due diligence: the title, liens and permits are checked for you by your own legal representative and the notario.

This page says what we do and, as plainly, what we do not claim to do. The fraud problem in Tulum is real, and a broker's listing is not a guarantee.

The two checks on the property

• The developer's background. Who they are, what they have built and delivered, and whether anything about them gives us pause.
• A visit to the property. We go and see it.

Neither check examines the title, and a good result on both does not mean the title is clean. A background check is a judgment about a developer, not a certificate, and a visit shows what is there on the day. Treat them as a screen, not a verdict.

The checks on the listing itself

Separate from the property, each listing is audited as data, because a listing can look complete and still be wrong in ways a buyer cannot see. Among other things, the audit looks for:

• Homes marked sold. A listing marked sold can stay on the site as a record of the sale, but it must not be featured, and the audit flags it if it is. The check reads the sold mark, so it cannot catch a sale nobody has recorded yet.
• Price and size fields that do not match. A price shown to a reader must also be set in the field that search filters read, or the listing drops out of a filtered search. A price shown in one figure and sorted as another is flagged.
• Pesos in a dollar field. Some Mexico City prices are in pesos, so those listings are kept out of price comparisons, and any price far above the market is flagged to check it was not entered in pesos.
• Delivery dates that have passed. A listing still marked pre-construction after its stated delivery date is flagged, because the stage or the date is out of date.
• The same property listed twice. Two pages for one home are flagged so one can be removed.
• Search titles and descriptions over the length limits.
• Return claims and price-rise language in the copy. The audit flags both for review. We do not publish a market-wide return figure.
• One featured property at a time. The property of the week and the article feature each belong to one listing, never the same one.

These screens find problems; they do not prove a listing is free of them. We run them before we feature, send or publish a listing, and what they find is reviewed. On any given day some live listings carry findings that have not been fixed yet.

What we do not check for you

We do not check the title, the liens certificate, the building permits or the land status as part of listing a property. Your own legal representative and the notario (a government-appointed notary who acts as the legal authority on the transaction, not a US-style notary) do those during due diligence.

Reported 2026 figures show why that matters. Over 200 formal real estate fraud complaints were filed in Tulum in two years, and the state flagged 29 developments for advertising and taking deposits without the required certificate or licenses. Warning signs include a title with no registry folio number, parcel numbers that differ between documents, a seller who resists an independent notary, communal (ejido) land presented as private, and a developer selling before its permits exist.

This page is general information about our process, not legal advice. Confirm the title, permits and every term of your own purchase with the notario and your own adviser.

Sources: Tulum Land and Property's listing process, confirmed October 11, 2026, and its listing data audit; fraud complaint and flagged-development figures as reported by TulumTimes, The Yucatan Times and EV Tulum, 2025 to 2026.