The U.S. dollar has slipped below ₡450 again in Costa Rica, continuing a trend that has steadily reduced the spending power of foreign residents who earn their income in dollars and increased pressure on the tourism industry. The dollar closed yesterday at an average of ₡449.24 in Costa Rica’s Monex foreign exchange market, down from ₡450.03 in the previous session. It remains close to the record lows reached in August, including ₡448.96 on August 14.
For those North American and Canadian retirees, remote workers and other foreign residents receiving income in U.S. dollars, the impact is that the same number of dollars now buys noticeably fewer colones. At the beginning of 2026, the Monex dollar rate stood at about ₡497. By Tuesday it had fallen to ₡449.24, a decline of nearly 10% in eight months.
As an example, take someone living in Costa Rica on a $3,000 monthly pension or other dollar-based income. Using the Monex rate simply as a benchmark, $3,000 was worth about ₡1.49 million at the beginning of January. At Tuesday’s rate, it is worth roughly ₡1.35 million. That is a difference of about ₡143,500 every month without the person’s income changing at all.
The actual rate consumers receive is generally worse because banks and exchange houses make money on the difference between their buying and selling rates. Today, several of Costa Rica’s major banks were buying dollars at around ₡442 and selling them at around ₡456.
For people who have followed the dollar’s decline over the past several years, the difference is even more dramatic. The dollar reached ₡696.76 in Monex in June 2022. Compared with Tuesday’s ₡449.24 rate, each dollar is now worth about ₡247.50 less, a decline of roughly 35.5%.
That does not mean the cost of living in Costa Rica has fallen by 35%. Rent, groceries, electricity, private health care, restaurant meals and other expenses have followed their own price trends. But anyone earning dollars and paying bills in colones has lost a significant amount of purchasing power.
The situation also makes Costa Rica more expensive for tourists. A hotel stay, restaurant bill or tour priced at ₡100,000 would have cost a visitor about $201 when the exchange rate was around ₡497 at the beginning of the year. At ₡449, that same ₡100,000 bill works out to roughly $223.
Nothing about the Costa Rican price changed but a visitor simply needs more dollars to pay it. That exchange-rate effect is one reason tourism businesses have repeatedly complained about the strong colón. Hotels, tour companies and transportation businesses often receive a large share of their revenue in dollars while paying wages, electricity, taxes, supplies and other local expenses in colones.
Recent tourism numbers illustrate the unusual situation. Costa Rica received just over 2 million international visitors through July, up 6.4% from the same period in 2025. Tourism income has also been strong and yet hotel, restaurant and tourism industry representatives continue to warn that their profit margins are being squeezed because the dollars they collect are worth fewer colones when converted to cover local costs.
The problem is particularly important because the United States remains by far Costa Rica’s most important source of foreign tourists. Air arrivals increased in July overall, but arrivals from the United States grew only 0.4% compared with July 2025. The strong colón does have winners.
Costa Ricans earning colones get more dollars when traveling abroad, buying imported goods or paying expenses priced in U.S. currency. Businesses that import products can also benefit from a cheaper dollar. But for the large number of foreign residents who moved to Costa Rica partly because of the cost of living, the trend has moved in the opposite direction.
A monthly Social Security payment, pension or remote-work salary that once stretched comfortably across rent, groceries, transportation and entertainment does not go as far when converted into colones. There is also little indication that the dollar is about to make a major comeback.
Economists have pointed to the large supply of dollars entering Costa Rica through tourism, exports, foreign investment and other sources as one reason the currency has remained weak. Earlier projections suggested the dollar could remain below ₡500 throughout 2026. The Central Bank has occasionally stepped into the market when the dollar has fallen sharply.
On August 26, for example, it purchased $9.2 million as the Monex rate dropped to ₡449.35. No such stabilization intervention was reported during Tuesday’s session.For dollar earners living in Costa Rica, the latest move below ₡450 is therefore less a sudden crisis than the continuation of a trend they have been feeling for several years.
And every time the dollar loses a few more colones, that squeeze becomes a little harder to ignore.
