Villas 5 and 6 in Manuel Antonio: what comes next
Costa Rica’s first luxury jungle tree house villa development in Manuel Antonio didn’t start with a blueprint — it started with a gap in the market. After nearly two decades sending high‑end travelers to Costa Rica, I saw guests craving private villas with five‑star hotel‑level service in one of the country’s most in‑demand destinations, but…
Richard Bexon
Managing Director
Four villas in. Two more underway. When we started Manuel Antonio Tree House Villas in 2023, the plan was to prove a concept: that Manuel Antonio had a real gap in the market for private luxury villas with hotel-level service. Villas 1, 2, and 3 proved it. Villa 4 refined it. Villas 5 and 6 will take it further.
As I write this, we are three months from completing the next two villas at the property. This page is a forward reference: what we are building, what we learned from the first four, and what changes next. A full developer diary will follow on completion.
Where the project stands today
Villas 1, 2, and 3 were 3-bedroom jungle tree house villas, each with a private pool, outdoor kitchen, and direct views into the canopy. They launched in August 2025 and filled quickly, validating the model we had been building toward since 2023.
Villa 4 was a deliberate step forward. We moved from 3 to 4 bedrooms, applied every lesson documented during the first three builds, and completed the villa in under four months using our own construction company, COBE Construction. The result was the most controlled handover of any villa in the project to date.
What Villas 5 and 6 will bring to the development
Each new villa in this project has been an iteration, not a replica. Villas 5 and 6 continue that approach. Building on four completed villas and two full operational seasons, the improvements being applied go beyond finishes and layout. They reflect what guests have actually told us, what the operations team has flagged, and what the market is asking for.
The full breakdown of design decisions, construction methods, and lessons applied will be covered in the developer diary. What we can confirm now is the direction:
- Elevated sustainability standards. From materials selection to energy systems, Villas 5 and 6 are being built with a higher bar for environmental performance than any previous unit in the project.
- Refined luxury specifications. Every finish category has been reviewed against guest feedback from Villas 1 to 4. The changes are specific, not cosmetic.
- Continued use of COBE Construction. The same team that delivered Villa 4 ahead of schedule is executing Villas 5 and 6, with the same embedded engineer and foreman model that made Villa 4 work.
The story so far: a project built on iteration
This development did not start as a masterplan with six villas. It started as a question: was there a market for serviced luxury villas in Manuel Antonio that combined the privacy of a private villa with the standards of a five-star hotel? After nearly two decades in Costa Rica’s high-end travel industry, the answer seemed obvious. But obvious ideas still need proof.
Villas 1, 2, and 3 provided that proof. The permitting process through the Municipality of Quepos was slower and more demanding than anticipated. The 2024 rainy season was the wettest on record, pushing the foundation phase back by weeks. And finishing three villas simultaneously across a hillside jungle site in Manuel Antonio tested every system we had. We made it, but not without significant course corrections along the way.
Villa 4 was where those course corrections became the system. A documented lessons-learned process, a decision to build our own construction company, an embedded team on direct payroll, upfront materials procurement including U.S. imports, and a redesigned build sequence that erected the full metal structure before pouring any concrete. The villa was handed to operations on Dec. 10, 2025. Guests arrived without stress-testing it.
Villas 5 and 6 are built on that foundation.
What to expect in the full developer diary
When Villas 5 and 6 are complete, we will publish a full developer diary covering the build from groundbreaking to handover. Based on the previous diaries in this series, that will include:
- The specific design and sustainability changes applied and why
- Construction timeline and what we did differently
- Supply chain decisions and what we sourced locally versus imported
- Team structure and how the COBE Construction model evolved
- Revenue and operational implications for the full six-villa property
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