By Donna Cornelius
Alabamians who have moved away from their home state sometimes decide to head back to the South.
Katharine Hibberts went a little farther — to south of the border.
After graduating from Auburn University, the former Mountain Brook resident moved to New York City to work in the fashion industry. But for the past 12 years, she’s lived in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, and owns an upscale vacation home rental business there.
“After Sept. 11, I decided it was time to move on from New York and go in a different direction,” Hibberts said. “Also, if you’re not making crazy money in New York, it’s expensive to live there. I was close to 30 and was thinking I didn’t want to have to have three roommates.”
While Hibberts was living in New York, her mother, Nancy Howze, had made a major move of her own. Howze was a real estate agent in Birmingham for many years, her daughter said.
“The year I moved to New York, my mom had found out about San Miguel through a friend,” Hibberts said. “She came down for a week and loved it. Six months later, in 1997, she moved here. I thought she’d lost her mind.”
But when Hibberts visited San Miguel, she understood its appeal, she said.
“Once my friends come here, they come back,” she said. “San Miguel has this magic about it. It’s like a little piece of Europe in Mexico.”
Others are taking notice of San Miguel. Hibberts and Howze were featured in a recent Garden and Gun magazine article about the city.
After leaving New York, Hibberts found herself in “this limbo place” career-wise, she said.
“My mom’s friend had a company, and he wanted to keep the real estate part of it but sell the house rental and house management part,” she said. “I had done marketing and sales, so I bought it and changed the name to Premier San Miguel. The company already had an inventory of homes. I jumped into the fire feet first.”
Hibberts, who’s 40, said she was still learning Spanish when she began her business venture.
“Two employees stayed on, and they taught me about working with the staff,” she said. “It was a crazy year full of challenges.”
The business has changed since Hibberts bought it, she said.
“Then, the rental fees were from $300 a week to $800 a week,” she said. “Now, they’re $1,400 to $17,000 a week. We started with 100 houses but have 50 houses now. I wanted a more boutique type of environment.”
Rental units in Gulf Shores and Destin, Fla., often are investment properties for their owners. That’s not usually the case with Hibberts’ properties, she said.
“These are people’s real second homes,” she said. “They’re not like most condos at the beach. They’re more personal.”
Premier San Miguel properties range from cozy pieds-à-terre to seven-bedroom villas. Some have pools and other amenities.
“All the houses have staff, so you can have a real vacation here,” Hibberts said. “I went to Europe and rented an apartment once and then thought, ‘We have to clean up?’”
San Miguel itself is always a pleasant surprise for first-time visitors, Hibberts said. It’s in central Mexico, about three hours north of Mexico City, and has a rich history and cultural heritage.
“Other colonial towns don’t have the caliber and sophistication of San Miguel,” she said. “We have great chefs and restaurants. We also have cobblestone streets, so leave your high heels at home.”
San Miguel is 500 years old, and many houses there are 300 years old, Hibberts said.
“This is a World UNESCO Heritage Site, so they have very strict architectural guidelines,” she said. “You can’t add a garage. If the front of your house has one window, you can’t add any more. You can use only certain paint colors. But it helps to preserve San Miguel.”
Most houses don’t have central air or heat – but usually neither is needed, Hibberts said.
“Summer is lovely here,” she said. “It’s a dry heat, not humid.”
Hibberts’ company provides transportation to and from the airport. Most Southerners fly from Atlanta or Houston into Leon, Mexico, which is about an hour and 15 minutes away from San Miguel, she said.
Hibberts’ company can help make clients’ vacations more fun, she said.
“We can arrange chefs’ dinners, hot air balloon rides, and tours,” she said.
She also can set up visits to places like nearby El Santuario de Atotonilco, a church known as the Sistine Chapel of the Americas.
“There’s a lot of history here,” she said. “The Mexican Revolution started here. Mexicans know so much about their history and are passionate about it.”
One of the best things about her job is meeting new people, she said.
“We have a lot of clients from Texas and some from California and New York,” she said. “We had an artist from Arkansas. The makeup of our clients has changed. In the past, about 99 percent were from the U.S. Now, we get a lot of Canadians and more Europeans – even some Australians. And a lot of Mexican nationals are realizing this is a fun place to visit.”
San Miguel also has become a wedding destination, Hibberts said.
“I can put people in touch with a wedding planner,” she said. “I have houses that you can use for weddings with 150 guests.”
Owning a business in Mexico “has its hoops” to jump through, Hibberts said.
“I had to have a work visa and had to start a corporation,” she said. “The tax laws are daunting; you file every two months. Labor laws are different, too. There was a lot to learn. But I feel comfortable now with how things go here.”
Hibberts often returns to Alabama, she said.
“My brother lives in Liberty Park and I have friends in Birmingham, so I visit a lot,” she said.
She’s happy, however, with her decision to take a risk and move to Mexico,
“San Miguel is so beautiful and attracts so many people from all over the world, from CEOs to museum curators,” she said. “I can walk upstairs and look at my calendar, but I never know what the day will bring or who I’ll meet.”
For more information, visit www.premiersanmiguel.com, or call the company’s U.S. phone number, 646-536-7634.
