My Teak Plantation

Now that I have the proceeds of the sale of my condo in my account, I can make the transfer to Panama to pay for the teak plantation. But, wait, not so fast!

10 year old teak trees!

It takes 70 years for spruce and fir, but only 25 years +/- for teak!

I am buying the teak plantation to be eligible for a reforestation visa. Jeff, the CEO of Panama Teak Forestry, and their lawyer Lill of Kery Cruz are very helpful in telling me exactly how to go about it, and what to be careful about.

The rule says, the plantation has to be in my name (that is, not in the name of a foundation or company I might have in Panama), and the funds have to be transferred from a Non-Panamanian account in my name straight to the PTF account. Plus, they want a notarized and apostilled confirmation of the transfer from the bank where my account is from which I make the transfer.

Well, E*Trade is a 21st century bank, where everything is done online. There is no branch, where I could go to get a document with a signature of a live person that can be notarized and apostilled! 

Panama is a developing country, which is under strong pressure from the US to be diligent about money transfers, due to a history of money laundering. So, the Panamanian banks, as well as the Panamanian government want to make sure everything is in right order, but they use 20th century processes. 

I talk to Customer Service at E*Trade, but they, too, are at their wit's end about how to get this accomplished. They can send me a transfer confirmation, no problem. And it is on their letter head, no problem either. But, it is an email attachment, thus doesn't have a live-ink signature.

I end up printing the email document, and writing on it that I swear by perjury of law that this is an authentic document. I sign it in front of the notary and get his seal. Then I submit that form to the GSCCA who apostilles Georgia notarizations. I hope, this will satisfy the Panamanian Immigration department. We'll see...

Two days after I initiated the transfer, I get an email from PTF notifying me that their bank is threatening to reject the wire if we all don't submit within 2 days a bunch of documents! 

They request: The singed contract (of course), six months worth of statements of the account where the money originated (well, ok, too) that also shows this transfer. Heck! How am I getting a bank statement in the middle of April, that shows a transaction that happened in the middle of April? Impossible! Statements are created at the beginning of the month for the previous month! 

I decide to take a screenshot of my online-banking recent transactions page and submit that, together with the 6 months statements. Plus, for good measures, I add the HUD statement of my condo sale, too, to prove where the big deposit came from, that showed up on the account 5 days before the wire to Panama went out.

Two days later PTF emails me, that the transfer was accepted and the funds were credited to their account. Yeay! First hurdle taken successfully!

Now I can go back to Panama, buy my land, and start building my home...