About Marenal and MPA
Who runs Marenal, how the Marenal Partner Association works, and the voluntaryist and sociocratic principles behind it.
Who runs Marenal day to day
Ariana Ugalde
General Manager of GLP S.A., the property management company. Administration, vendor coordination, and a cuota holder herself.
Marlon Muñoz
Operations Manager. A native of Tronadora on Lake Arenal. Property maintenance, farm activities, machinery and construction coordination.
Manuel Talavera
Construction Manager and owner of our in-house construction company.
Kenneth Artavia Mora
Architect, CFIA A-37226. A native of the Arenal region, with sustainable design experience and knowledge of local building conditions.
Helen Rodas
Assistant to Franz and Partner Relations Manager.
Off site we work with Muralegal for legal matters, Despacho Gómez y Asociados for accounting, INS for insurance, and Banco Nacional de Costa Rica in Nuevo Arenal.
Marenal is run by an organisation, not by one man. The structure is designed to continue regardless of Franz’s involvement, and every contract is honoured either way.
The Marenal Partner Association
The Marenal Partner Association is registered as a limited liability company, a Sociedad Limitada or S.R.L., under Costa Rican law. When 11 cuotas are distributed it is activated and managed as a sociocracy.
This is not a homeowners’ association with a board of directors and majority voting. It is a member-owned company controlled by cuota holders and managed by a General Council and its Sub Circles through consent-based decision making.
How the cuotas are held
4
4 cuotas exist today: Franz, his son Xavier, his daughter Silja, and Ariana Ugalde
7
7 cuotas are open to founding partners, 1 each
11
11 cuotas in total, and 11 founders of the MPA
Phase Two adds up to 21 further partners, each holding 1 cuota, managed by the same General Council. Operated as an S.R.L. the association is limited to 50 members.
What the partners decide
The MPA uses GLP S.A. for the daily operation of Marenal. GLP is presently owned by Franz and managed by Ariana, who is also a cuota holder.
That arrangement protects the interests of all partners, because both parties share the same security and development interests.
The MPA sets direction on:
✔ Property and road maintenance
✔ Security and gate management
✔ Utility and infrastructure development
✔ Pool and social centre operations
✔ Farm operations and agricultural land use
✔ New lot development timing
✔ Community property development
✔ Commercial property use and disposition
✔ Budgeting and monthly fees
Once formed, the General Council and its Sub Circles can modify all existing Guidelines, Rules and Regulations and legal documents, and can create relationships with organisations, agencies and government departments as advisable.
Donated to the partners, not sold to them
Franz is donating 4.6 hectares of Highway 143 frontage, within the 55 acres, to the Marenal Partner Association. The titles are held by our attorneys until the transfer takes place, which happens once 22 lots have been sold and there are 22 cuota holders. Until then, all taxes and maintenance remain his responsibility.
Every partner ends up a 1/32 owner of that frontage, at no additional cost, alongside the community properties.
What the partners then do with it is theirs to decide, through the General Council. Franz’s stated reason is that he wants the partners, not him, to determine its best use over time. If that number of sales is never reached, the commercial properties remain with Franz and his heirs.
Why we chose this structure
We have elected to be a Comunidad Agricola, an agricultural community, because it is the format best suited to our sociocratic and voluntaryist structure. It is simpler and easier to manage than a condominium, a cooperative, or a community association.
A Comunidad Agricola can be a Sociedad Limitada rather than a Sociedad Anonima. The Limitada has cuotas instead of shares and can be run by a sociocratic general council, where a Sociedad Anonima has shares and a board of directors.
Lot sizes, and what you maintain
Phase One lots all have access to Highway 143, a public national road, so different rules apply and those lots can be smaller. They can be maintained by their owners, or by GLP at the owner’s choice.
The interior lots in Phase Two do not front a public road, so under Costa Rican law each must be a minimum of 5,000 square metres. Every lot has a delineated building site. The building platform is where the home and gardens go, and it is maintained by the owner, or by GLP at the owner’s expense. The rest of the lot is administered by the MPA, which determines its use.
A fair question
If I bought roughly 5,000 square metres, why can I not use all of it myself?
A partner is buying a building pad, much as he would in a condominium, and the rest of his land becomes land the community takes care of. He remains the legal owner and can sell his property at any time. Because he is also part of the organisation that manages and administers all properties, and an equal owner of the common and commercial properties, the advantages are straightforward. It is what makes co-housing work.
Voluntaryism
Voluntaryism holds that all human interaction must be based on voluntary consent, not on coercion, force or aggression. This is not a preference. It is a foundational principle.
At Marenal it means:
✔ No one forces you to participate in community activities
✔ No one imposes rules you did not consent to
✔ No one takes your property or dictates how you act without your agreement
✔ All your relationships and obligations are voluntary
Sociocracy
Sociocracy is a governance system based on consent, not majority vote. Consent is not consensus. Consensus means everyone agrees. Consent means no one holds a principled objection that would prevent a decision from moving forward.
A principled objection is not "I don’t like this" or "I prefer something else." A principled objection is "This decision would harm the community, or me, in this measurable way, and here is why.
How a decision gets made
01
Proposal
Someone proposes a solution to a perceived problem.
02
Discussion
Members discuss it and raise concerns.
03
Consent round
Each member is asked whether they hold a principled objection
No voting. No decision forced over an objection. This protects minority positions from the tyranny of simple majority rule.
04
Outcome
If no objections are voiced, the decision proceeds. If someone objects, the proposal is explained again, modified, or withdrawn. If no consent is reached, the proposal does not move forward and the status quo remains.
Co-housing
You own your home outright and share the common spaces. The community functions better when partners share their talents, and sometimes their tools, meals and belongings, with their neighbours. All of it voluntary. We call it cooperation without coercion.
Our operating philosophy
Franz’s inspiration for this community goes back to Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson’s ideal political order, though committed to states’ rights, called for a far greater decentralisation, in which small sections of the country would be self-governing wards making virtually all of their own political decisions without outside interference. His goal was a system in which no entity of a higher order would infringe on the just prerogatives of one of a lower order.
Organised that way, the chances of military conflict and wasteful spending are minimised, and peace and free trade have a better chance.
Franz believes a return to small, like-minded communities united in self-rule, political neutrality, and the right to defend their families and property against harm and unlawful taking can be the basis of peaceful coexistence. That is why he adopted voluntaryism and sociocracy as the core principles for Marenal.
The man who built it
Franz Xaver Meier was born in Munich in 1939, six months before the war began. He experienced the destruction of that war and the hardship of the years after it, and those years shaped a lifelong rejection of force in favour of voluntary cooperation. When his conscription papers arrived for the new German army, he left the country. He arrived in America in 1960.
He spent 50 years in the restaurant and hospitality industry in Europe and the United States, including as Vice President of Food and Beverage at Sea Pines Resort on Hilton Head Island, working for Charles Fraser, one of America’s first eco-community developers. In 1976 he moved to Charleston and started several restaurant concepts that came to employ more than 300 people. In 2010 the City of Charleston recognised him as one of 35 visionaries who shaped it. Along the way he also ran a commercial real estate company and owned a factory producing advanced building panels.
He first visited Costa Rica in 1995 and bought this land in 2000 as his own Plan B. He purchased a second property in 2004 and ran it as a cattle farm, sold that farm in 2022, and used the proceeds to fund Marenal. He has lived here full time since 2024, in a house completed that year, and oversees the property daily.
Succession
What happens next
Franz is 87, and his succession is planned for when he retires. His son Xavier will oversee operations and finances. His daughter Silja will advise on health, exercise and nutrition. Ariana will continue to operate GLP with her staff.
The MPA structure is independent of Franz’s involvement, and all contracts are unaffected by his status. The legal framework is designed to outlast him.
✔ The property management team continues operations
✔ The MPA governance structure remains intact
✔ All purchase agreements and contracts are honoured
✔ The legal framework persists independent of Franz