The Depósito Libre Comercial de Golfito heads into November with almost nothing new on the shopper's side of the counter. The authorized allowance listed by JUDESUR is ¢1,848,800, and the registration steps it describes are the ones it has published for some time. The changes this year happened in the leases, the legislature and a Contraloría audit. They decide which stores you will find open when you walk in. They will also shape the complex long after this holiday season.
Timing matters here. In La Nación's account of the 2024 figures, December, November and January issued more purchase authorizations than any other months. So the stretch starting this month is the one the June law and the August audit will be judged against.
The counter side: one allowance, one card, one day
The allowance is set at four times Costa Rica's salario base. The Poder Judicial fixed that base at ¢462,200 for 2026, effective January 1. Four times that is ¢1,848,800, the exact figure on JUDESUR's shopper page. Because the number is tied to the salario base, it moves only when the court's figure moves.
Here is how the trip works, according to JUDESUR's Depósito page:
- Registration happens in person at the Golfito customs post. Citizens and residents bring a valid identity card in good condition, and foreign visitors bring a valid passport.
- Eligibility covers anyone over 18, Costa Rican or foreign.
- Shopping starts as soon as the authorization is issued. The FAQ lists no additional waiting period.
- Coming and going on the shopping day is allowed as many times as you like until closing.
- Combining allowances for a purchase bigger than one person's limit is allowed only among specified direct relatives or spouses and partners, with proof of the relationship.
- Hours are 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on Sunday. Authorizations are handed out during the same hours.
The authorization has been free and digital since physical cards were retired in 2020. You can split the allowance across several purchases. Once the balance is used up, the next round of shopping waits until the following year, as La Nación explained in July 2025. The same report said JUDESUR and Hacienda were working on virtual pre-registration that would remove the in-person step. JUDESUR's page still points shoppers to the customs post. JUDESUR also links an annual 2026 schedule from that page, and it is the place to check for holiday closures before you set out.
The landlord side moved in June
Shoppers rarely think about concession terms, but those terms decide whether the store names you know can stay on past their current contracts.
In June 2026 the Legislative Assembly unanimously passed bill 25.424 on second reading, as CRHoy reported. Its full title is the Ley para la Protección del Desarrollo Económico y Social de la Zona Sur de la Provincia de Puntarenas. The bill became Law 10,964 when it was published in Alcance No. 80 to La Gaceta No. 116 on June 24, 2026. The published text sets out three main terms.
- JUDESUR is authorized to agree directly with current concessionaires on an extension of their contracts, rather than sending those spaces back to public tender.
- For those extensions, the existing rent rises once, by 25%, for the first five years. From the sixth year it is updated by appraisal and can go up or down.
- Concessions and their extensions run for ten years, provided the concessionaire meets the operating rules and contract conditions. New or vacant spaces still go through a public tender.
Before the law, tenants could lose their spaces when contracts ran out and the units went back to tender. That risk is why lawmakers acted. In the same CRHoy report, Deputy Norjelens Lobo said tenants named three obstacles to new investment: high rents, worn infrastructure and fewer visitors. When the bill was introduced, the complex was running fewer than half of the 54 commercial spaces it opened with, and 25 spaces were out to tender in August 2025.
So the law gives the operators already in place a direct path to staying. JUDESUR's commercial directory lists Dutty Free in Local 1, El Verdugo in Local 2, Grupo Monge in Local 3, Jerusalem Dutty Free in Local 4, Perco in Local 5 and Inversiones Hamburgo in Local 6. Further down, the directory adds a second Jerusalem Dutty Free in Local 50 and El Cometa el Mejor Precio in Local 52. These are the counters whose concessionaires can now negotiate an extension directly with JUDESUR.
Eight new storefronts and an audit
The law covers existing tenants. The newest part of the complex is a separate story.
JUDESUR used a real estate trust for a project planned around 14 commercial stores, an administrative building and an upgraded electrical system, according to a Contraloría General de la República audit dated August 27, 2026. The audit found the administrative building was never built. The audit's timeline for the eight new stores does not line up with earlier press coverage:
| Date | What happened | Source |
|---|---|---|
| April 22, 2025 | Official opening of eight newly built commercial spaces | La Nación |
| November 2025 | JUDESUR takes delivery of the eight new stores | CGR audit |
| June 30, 2026 | Vacancy's estimated opportunity cost reaches ₡342.78 million | CGR audit |
| July 2026 | All eight still unoccupied | CGR audit |
| August 27, 2026 | Audit report issued | CGR audit |
The gap between a ribbon-cutting in April 2025 and a formal handover in November 2025 matters to anyone who visited in between and wondered why the new wing was dark. By the audit's count, those eight spaces brought in none of the income they were built to generate between November 2025 and July 2026.
The audit also found that JUDESUR had no formal preventive and corrective maintenance plan and no final as-built drawings. It recorded standing water on the second floor of Local 15. Repair and verification items involving the electrical connection, fire pump, ventilation equipment and transformers had no documented technical closure as of July 3, 2026.
JUDESUR took two steps while the audit was under way. It added the delivered works to its Instituto Nacional de Seguros policy, and it opened a procedure in SICOP, the public procurement system, to lease seven of the eight new stores. If those leases are signed in time, the season starting now would be the first time the new wing opens to holiday shoppers.
Why the December crowd matters past Golfito
Traffic through the complex was healthy as recently as 2024. La Nación reported 310,495 purchase authorizations that year, 2.7% more than the 302,252 issued in 2023, along with 267,916 visitors in 2024. That puts the vacancies down to the building and the leases rather than a lack of shoppers. The audit and the June law both target the building and the leases, not the shopper rules.
The money also travels. As CRHoy noted in its coverage of the law, part of the complex's sales funds JUDESUR, which puts money into infrastructure, education, support for producers and emergency response across Golfito, Coto Brus, Corredores, Osa, Buenos Aires and Puerto Jiménez. A refrigerator bought in Golfito in December helps pay for projects up the coast in Osa as well.
For the trip itself, the essentials are already set. Bring an ID card or passport. Register at the customs post before you shop, and budget against ¢1,848,800. If you are pooling allowances for one large purchase, the relatives combining them will need proof of the relationship. The allowance and registration details here are general information drawn from JUDESUR's published guidance, not legal or tax advice. Confirm your own situation with JUDESUR or the customs post before you travel.
Golfito's waterfront, port and the institutions around them are part of how our team at Christie's International Real Estate South Pacific Costa Rica reads this corner of the coast. If you want to talk about what the Depósito's new ten-year concession terms could mean for Golfito, Inquire Now.
