We continue to bring your round-ups on the luxury real estate scene in popular areas for vacation or retirement. This month we travel to the Spanish colonial gem of Nicaragua—Granada.

This attractive city on a lake, less than an hour from the international airport in Managua, has witnessed a cycle familiar to those of you who have been reading about real estate in the Americas for a while. Before word got out you could buy or restore a colonial home in the center for well under $100,000. Then as the major media piled in and declared Granada to be the next big thing, the U.S. bubble money flowed and speculators piled in. Then the crash came up north and prices dropped. They didn’t drop back to where they started of course, but those who bought at the top are going to be waiting a while to get their money back, much as the buyers in California, Nevada, Arizona, and Florida will be waiting.

If this is your time to buy though, you’ve got to think this is a good point in the cycle. Prices have leveled off and are probably accurately reflecting real worth. So check out our detailed story on luxury real estate in Granada, Nicaragua to see what you can get for $400K to $500K, the range where most of the best high-end properties are tapping out.

On the luxury real estate side of our online magazine, we’ve covered Mexico more than any other country and are returning to the Caribbean side for the third time. There’s a simple reason for both of these facts: Mexico is the most popular real estate investment country for Americans and Canadians and the Cancun/Riviera Maya region is the most popular area in all of Latin America when it comes to the number of vacationers landing there each year.

Even if only a tiny fraction of those visitors get tempted to buy property, that’s still a fraction of the 13 million people who came through Cancun’s airport last year. If I’m not mistaken, that’s several times more visitors than any other country in Latin America receives per year. To put it in perspective, about six times what Costa Rica receives.

Not all of those people who decide to buy their piece of paradise are luxury buyers, but those who do have plenty of money to spend are not spoiled for choice. High-rise condos, airy indoor-outdoor villas, American-style grand homes on golf courses, or eco-friendly bungalows surrounded by vegetation are all on the block here. The depth of choices might surprise you and since the real estate collapse to the north a few years ago, prices that were already reasonable by U.S. standards have dropped a bit (but are reversing direction now…) What you get for your money on this side of Mexico is generally more than you’ll get on the west coast in the hot tourism areas. Call it the “Silicon Valley Effect” or the “California Real Estate Boom Effect.” The Caribbean coast just never hit the same bubble level as the Pacific coast, so in many ways the market here is healthier.

Our latest story runs down some options, with details and pricing, on places stretching along the coast. See our full story on luxury real estate in Cancun, Cozumel, and the Riviera Maya.

Buenos Aires, Argentina is one of the most vibrant and enchanting cities on the planet. With the feel of Europe but with a Latin flair and far lower prices, Argentina’s best-known destination enchants almost everyone who lands here and more than a few start to think, “Wouldn’t it be nice to buy a little place and move here?”

Many did just that over the past decade and the ones that pounced on opportunity a decade ago made out like bandits. Those bargain basement days have disappeared for a variety of reasons: a recovering and more stable economy, a rising domestic demand as locals put money into real estate as an inflation hedge, and increasingly wealthier Brazilians buying up prime condos.

Still, Buenos Aires is a good value when you compare it to comparable major cities around the world and the reasons it is a great place to live are still all in place. You just need to be careful in your searching and buying—both in terms of neighborhoods and in terms of navigating the obstacles that can trip you up.

To get an idea of prices, pitfalls, and places, check out our latest real estate round-up on buying real estate in Buenos Aires.

(And you’ll need a place to stay when you land, so see our reviews of the best hotels in Buenos Aires.)

We often feature real estate destinations that are all about the flash and prestige. Much of the Pacific Coast of Mexico and Costa Rica has turned into a game of one-upsmanship, which showed no signs of slowing until California’s real estate crash hit.

Mazatlan was always a bit removed from all that, despite its location closer to the U.S. than many other destinations. The bubble never got very big, so the real estate market didn’t grind to a halt. Prices are off a bit from the peak, but they were never much out of whack to start with. A million bucks goes a long way in this region.

There are many reasons for this, but one of the main ones is that Mazatlan has not been a flashy, upper-crust resort city. There’s little reason for the paparazzi to hang out here watching for celebrities. That doesn’t mean, however, that you can’t find a luxury dream home or waterfront penthouse. It just means you’ll pay a lot less for it than you would in Cabo San Lucas or the Riviera Nayarit. Apart from Punta Mita, a golf and beach development like Estrella del Mar doesn’t even exist in those places: there’s not enough waterfront land available for such a grand scheme.

So if you want a luxury vacation or retirement home but you’re a value investor at heart, take a look at our latest real estate round-up. Pacific Mexico with Personality: Real Estate in Mazatlan.

Our latest real estate feature is on the bustling, red-hot market of Panama City, Panama.

If the fundamentals weren’t so strong, this would be looking like a bubble. It did take a slight breather when the U.S. recession hit, but unlike other Latin American retirement markets that depended on the yankees, this one is more diverse. Many of the buyers the past five years have been part of the “Chavez effect”: wealthy people moving their money out of Venezuela (and others that look to be headed that direction, like Bolivia). Other buyers are Latinos from countries where the political situation is more business-friendly, but they want to own property in this crossroads of the Americas, a stable country with a good banking system.

And of course Europeans, Canadians, and Americans are still a big part of the mix, especially those who like the combination of business opportunities, moving incentives, and the ability to keep their money in a place where it won’t get taxed heavily.

So while prices here are lower than they would be in other major world banking and commerce capitals (lower even than Mumbai, India, for example) you’re not going to swoop in and find fire sale bargain. Skyscrapers are selling out half or more of their units before the building is completed. The new Trump Ocean Club, which is a sail-shaped structure like the Burj Dubai, sold more than 80 percent before the doors opened, despite a price range of $250K to $1 million. The Yoo complex, with interiors by Philippe Starck, is seeing similar pre-sale numbers.

The Trump tower topped everything south of the U.S. for height, at 284 meters. Panama City now has the three tallest skyscrapers in Latin America. With the canal and protected forest on one side, the ocean on the other, there’s nowhere to go but up!

See the full story here: Luxury Real Estate in Panama City, Panama.

Our Trump hotel review isn’t up yet (it just opened its doors last week), but here are links to all the reviews of the best luxury hotels in Panama.