Del Pacifico, a master planned resort community on the central coast of
Costa Rica near Quepos and Manuel Antonio - has announced the launch of
the Del Pacifico Club, a private residence club offering fractional real
estate and carefree ownership. Fractional real estate and residence
clubs have grown in popularity because of the market conditions and
buyers get much more home for the money, lower upkeep costs and the ease
of ownership. Many consumers are finding it's the smarter way to own an
international second or vacation home.
Owners can choose from one, two and three bedroom villas nestled on a
hilltop overlooking the warm tropical waters of the Pacific, and woven
into the very fabric of Costa Rica's rich cultural heritage and stunning
natural beauty. Owners at the Del Pacifico Club will have exclusive
access to the amenities of it's sister property the Alma del Pacifico
Hotel, ranked a top ten in Central America. Owners will enjoy private
beach access, restaurant and bars, fitness facilities and their
acclaimed spa.
"We are excited to add the Del Pacifico Club to the other real estate
offerings at Del Pacifico, say Barry Strudwick, developer/partner at Del
Pacifico - "The residence club will give the ability for people who
love beautiful Costa Rica but realistically would only visit their home
here 5-6 times per year. They'll enjoy a luxury home and the services
of a boutique hotel for a fraction of the cost and none of the hassles
associated with owning international real estate or a home in Costa
Rica", adds Strudwick.
The Del Pacifico Club offers fractional ownership in the seaside village
nestled on a hill overlooking the Pacific. Additionally, the Club will
offer one-bedroom Plaza Studios and two-bedroom and three-bedroom
Villas. All the Del Pacifico Club units come fully and beautifully
furnished with prices starting at only 35,000.euros
The Residence Club at Del Pacifico is a fractionally owned residential
property. Buyers receive a 1/10th-deeded real estate interest in a
world-class Costa Rican vacation home without the hassles of
full-ownership. Like other forms of real estate, fractional residence
club ownership interests can be sold, willed, deeded or placed in a
trust. This proven real estate model has been coined the smarter way to
own a vacation home, and has been successful in other elite destinations
around the world.
Residence Club Partners of Asheville, NC, the management company at Del
Pacifico Club, feels this model will change the future of second home
ownership in Costa Rica forever. "In addition to a growing trend in
fractional ownership and residence club home ownership vs. whole
ownership, Owners are demanding more services and hassle free ownership
that residence club owners enjoy at all of our clubs. Owner services at
our clubs include a Club Concierge, housekeeping, onsite management and
very unique custom experience packages, things you don't get with the
typical real estate purchase," says Mandy Allfrey of Residence Club
Partners.
The Del Pacifico Club is a private residence club within the Del
Pacifico second home community near Quepos and Manuel Antonio, on Costa
Rica's beautiful central coast. Vacation and second home buyers
interested in learning more about The Del Pacifico Club in Esterillos,
can visit www.delpacificoclub.com
Dilemma:
Do I spend the next few paragraphs writing about how it feels to be in a
flotilla of three $1.2-million, 42-foot-long J Craft Torpedo boats
racing at 37 knots from Nice to Monaco to the latest Thomas Starke
restaurant for dinner? Or should I explain what it's like to barrel down
a narrow and gnarled two-lane road in a $500,000 car while trying to
get around a diesel Golf with the busted taillight in rural France the
very same weekend Francois Hollande got himself elected as the Socialist
president of the Republic? Both are pure, turgid fantasy material, as
is the Cap Estel, the hotel Rolls-Royce picked out. Located just next to
Cap D'ail on one of the more scenic portions of the Cote d'Azur, the
Cap Estel is a super discrete hotel surrounded on three sides by water
and usually intended for only the rich and famous. How rich, how famous?
Marlene Dietrich would stay in the room across the courtyard from mine
for three months at a time, and Humphrey Bogart, Cary Grant, and the
Beatles were frequent guests. I like to think Ringo stayed in my room.
As you can see, my choice of topics is quite the conundrum.
As this is Motor Trend
and not "One Percenter Weekly," I suppose I'll have to concentrate on
the car, which really doesn't cost $500,000. The blue Phantom Coupe I'm
talking about costs just $498,380, including $2000 for destination and
$3000 for the gas-guzzler tax. Rolls-Royce schlepped my admittedly
declasse self down to the South of France because it's just rolled out
the Phantom Series II, the first major refresh/redo of the Phantom since
the imposing sedan became available to the world's oligarchs and their
friends in 2003. This business plan continues, with the least-expensive
iteration of the new car starting at an eye-watering -- some might say
laughable -- $398,035. That's for the standard Saloon, sans options. Of
course, a small fortune is relative. Please consider that the median
U.S. household income is about $50,000, and the average transaction
price for a new car is around $30,000. Now consider that while the
average price for a Series II Phantom -- with bespoke options now
accounting for a full 30 percent of RR sales -- is around $500,000,
their owners' average net worth is $30 million. Average. They could
easily buy two Phantoms if they wanted to. Many do. Case in point: The
three J Crafts that spirited us to the principality of Monaco were
borrowed from current Rolls-Royce owners.
What's
new for Series II? Not much, as it turns out. One of Rolls-Royce's
guiding (and much trumpeted) principles comes from founder Sir Henry
Royce: "Take the best that exists and make it better." To hear Rolls
tell it, no better car exists, so the tweaking needed was minimal. "Our
claim is that we're still the best in the world," said Richard Carter,
the head of Rolls-Royce's global PR team. Starting with the exterior of
the four-door, gone are the odd-looking round foglights, replaced by an
all-new LED headlight setup featuring fully automatic brights and some
rectilinear daytime running lights. I think it's a big, if not a
conservative, improvement. Speaking of curveless, the imposing grille is
now made from a single piece of stainless steel, instead of three
pieces bonded together. It's a subtle tweak, but one that Rolls claims
is important to the "class of customer" that buys its automobiles. "They
notice details like this," I'm told.
Those
with an incredible eye for detail will note that the RR badge and
reflector between the wheel arch and door cut on the front fender are
now a single piece of trim as opposed to two. The C-pillar receives a
new and improved glass treatment and the rear bumper has been refined.
That and some new wheel options are pretty much it as far as exterior
tweaks. I spent the bulk of the weekend chatting with Rolls-Royce's new
head of exterior design, Giles Taylor, and he simply didn't have much to
do. He felt the original design was that strong. I agree with him. Cars
like the Phantom are as much a personal statement of status as
anything, and Rolls got it almost right back in 2003. Keep in mind,
Rolls recently poached Mr. Taylor away from Jaguar, where he led the
redesign of the new XJ. Point is, Giles can do radical when it's called
for. Obviously the changes to the Phantom are subtle, and an already
good-looking car now looks a bit better, a bit more tailored and
stately. Don't forget that while the Phantom Saloon is a formal sedan
that's nearly the size of an F-150. It has some very strong sporting
design cues like a long hood with short overhangs complete with a sporty
dash-to-axle ration, a very short rear deck, and a wheel and tire size
that's half the total vehicle height. Same proportions as an E-type, in
fact. Plus, Mr. Taylor has retained my personal favorite and utterly
British touch, the (relatively) tiny taillights. All that said, the
changes to the Coupe and Drophead Coupe's exteriors are even less
involved.
Inside,
more of the "if it ain't broke don't fix it" methodology pervades. The
cars are just as much the isolated, luxury cocoons they've been for the
last nine years. Burled wood, freakishly deep wool carpets (I kept my
shoes off whenever I was a passenger), and more than a dozen cows' worth
of leather make for one of the very nicest cabins, well, ever. There is
one big, significant interior change: the latest version of BMW's
iDrive is now standard in all Phantoms. The now very good version of
iDrive replaces the totally antiquated (and rightly despised) old
version found in the old Phantoms, the single biggest customer complaint
according to Rolls-Royce. Look at the new system for a few moments and
you'll see that it's nearly the exact same 8.8-inch screen and software
found in cars like the BMW 328i. Same bending backup angle lines, same
three-camera around-view system, same maps, same everything except for
the overall menu color scheme and a few Rolls-Royce-specific icons. But
remember that the only time a Phantom owner sees a 328i is when their
housekeeper gets back from the market. They've never sat inside a 3
Series, let alone tuned into Howard 100 via a BMW-branded iDrive. Also
remember that the system found in the Bentley Mulsanne, the Phantom's
only surviving competitor (RIP, Maybach), is a Volkswagen unit.
Oh,
but I shouldn't have said the B-word. It's very clear that Rolls-Royce
doesn't think anything competes with the Phantom, and that if it does
have any competition, the Mulsanne competes with their "cheaper" car,
the Ghost. Being one of the lucky few on earth who has spent time in
both the Mulsanne and the new Series II Phantom, I have a different
opinion. The four-door Phantom is the car to be driven in, especially if
you can weasel your way into the back of one of them extended
wheelbasers (base price, $475,295). But driving the new Phantom?
Honestly, it's not thrilling. Though I suppose that's not really the
point. There's plenty of play (and Novocain) in the steering, and the
cabin is eerily quiet -- so serene and so isolated that you can almost
hear your own heart beating. Honestly, with the radio off it's a little
spooky.
The
whole time I was behind the wheel, I felt like a chauffeur. Which, I
suppose, is the entire point. That's even with the new-to-the-four-door
(though carryover from the two-door) sport suspension and throttle
mapping turned on via an S button on the wheel. There's also a new (to
Phantom) eight-speed ZF transmission that replaces the old six-speed
unit and uses slightly less fuel. The transmission is now somehow even
quieter and less perceptible when it shifts gears. If a fortress of
solitude is what you're after, think Phantom Saloon, though driving-wise
there's not much difference between the new one and the old. The
direct-injected 6.75-liter V-12 remains the same. Power is still
"adequate." So much so that no one from Rolls mentioned the power output
even once (if you're boorish enough to ask, 453 horsepower and 531
lb-ft of torque) We'd have to compare them back-to-back to say for
certain, but I'd say the Mulsanne is the preferred driving enthusiast's
high-lux four-door. And that's been true since the big Bentley debuted.
Hell, that's been true since the 1930s.
However,
if I were in the market for a half-million-dollar car, I'd have the
Phantom Coupe. Why? Well, as cool as the rear suicide doors on the
four-door are (Rolls insists that you call them "coach doors"), the
front suicide doors on the Coupe are impossibly slicker. Talk about
making a dramatic entrance! Speaking of drama, a massive luxury sedan is
one thing. But a nearly just as massive two-door is on a whole other
level of flashing your decadence. Moreover, the Coupe is the much better
Roller to drive, featuring firmer suspension, much more sporting
steering feel, and an overall much less chauffeur-like vibe. Dare I say
this (quite literal) land yacht is engaging to throttle around a French
mountain road? Yes, I dare. Sure, I could use some more engine noise
when I stab the throttle, and since the hood is more than 3 feet off
the ground and more than twice that wide, it's a bit difficult to place
the huge machine exactly where you'd like. Small things that don't
really matter to the people writing the freaky large checks (or, if you
live in Moscow, handing over the cash from the in-dealer bank teller),
so the story goes. Case in point: My biggest gripe is that there's no
way to manually select a gear, especially since the Phantom Coupe allows
you to nicely set up a corner. I asked Rolls-Royce if they'd considered
a solution like paddle shifters. They responded that their customers
aren't interested in such things. Could be true, especially since the
folks that can afford the fantastically blue $498,380 Coupe I drove
probably already own not just a Ferrari, but a Ferrari collection. And
really I'm just nitpicking here. The Phantom Coupe, for lack of a better
term, is majestic. Gloriously so. If I may be so bold as to expand upon
F. Scott Fitzgerald's classic bon mot: The rich are different from you
and me; they have nicer cars. Such as the new Rolls-Royce Phantom Series
II.
"We are excited to add the Del Pacifico Club to the other real estate
offerings at Del Pacifico, say Barry Strudwick, developer/partner at Del
Pacifico - "The residence club will give the ability for people who
love beautiful Costa Rica but realistically would only visit their home
here 5-6 times per year. They'll enjoy a luxury home and the services
of a boutique hotel for a fraction of the cost and none of the hassles
associated with owning international real estate or a home in Costa
Rica", adds Strudwick.
The Residence Club at Del Pacifico is a fractionally owned residential
property. Buyers receive a 1/10th-deeded real estate interest in a
world-class Costa Rican vacation home without the hassles of
full-ownership. Like other forms of real estate, fractional residence
club ownership interests can be sold, willed, deeded or placed in a
trust. This proven real estate model has been coined the smarter way to
own a vacation home, and has been successful in other elite destinations
around the world.
The Del Pacifico Club is a private residence club within the Del
Pacifico second home community near Quepos and Manuel Antonio, on Costa
Rica's beautiful central coast. Vacation and second home buyers
interested in learning more about The Del Pacifico Club in Esterillos,
can visit www.delpacificoclub.com
