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Four people walk up a green slope at Rancho Regeneración toward the hills, under an orange sunset sky

What we believe

Before the houses, there was the land.

We believe a business can leave its place better than it found it. That's why Casa Oro exists: so San Juan del Sur, its people and its land come out ahead every time someone comes to stay.

San Juan del Sur bay from the air at sunset, with the town's rooftops and the sailboats

Why we exist

Leave places better than we found them.

The places, the people and the town's economy. That's how we measure it.

We don't want a business that grows at the expense of the town or the land. We want the opposite: every night you spend here keeps local people employed, keeps a farm regenerating its land, and builds a more responsible way to travel in Nicaragua.

Muffadal came to Nicaragua with a question: what if a business could fix things instead of breaking them? Casa Oro is the answer we keep building, together with the whole team.

Rancho Regeneración's dry forest runs down between two hills to the Pacific Ocean under a cloudy sky
People on the earthbag dome at Rancho Regeneración, with a ladder and blue sky

The land

It all started at Rancho Regeneración.

Before any house, there was a farm. There we grow food while letting the forest come back, with agroforestry and permaculture.

We build differently there too, with earthbags and bamboo: places that look after you and do the land as little harm as possible. We don't think you should have to choose between being comfortable and caring for the place.

The circle

What the kitchen leaves over comes back as food.

We think of the business as a forest: different parts that feed each other.

  1. The kitchenScraps from the Café Oro kitchen.
  2. The farmAt Rancho Regeneración they become compost.
  3. The landThe compost grows food.
  4. Your tableAnd that food comes back to the kitchen.
A man in a red shirt lifts a bundle of soaked leaves out of a blue barrel on a stick, in the Rancho Regeneración garden
A round bed of red soil with newly planted pepper plants, trees and green hills behind
A large circle of people standing under the trees, all with their arms raised
A man with a cup in front of the black and yellow Oro sun mural in San Juan del Sur

The town and its people

We live here, not next door.

A team from San Juan del Sur runs the houses. The same people clean your room, find you a board, tell you where to eat and book tomorrow's shuttle.

Someone from the team is at every house, day and night, and a real person answers you on WhatsApp. When you sleep here, eat at Café Oro or taste the chocolate, that work stays in town.

Café Oro's corner in San Juan del Sur: red CAFE ORO letters over yellow balconies, the doors open to the dining room
Melted chocolate pours from a metal bowl into bar molds

Made here

A kitchen and a chocolate factory.

On the ground floor of Casa Oro is Café Oro, the original Oro: coffee, cacao and cooking, made here.

And in San Juan del Sur we make chocolate from Nicaraguan cacao: it's roasted, ground and turned into bars right here. What started in that café is now in Chicago too, at Oro Chocolate & Coffee.

Where to eatOro Chocolate
Casa Oro's corner on a street in San Juan del Sur
The Nuestra Casa pool next to a covered terrace with two hammocks

Staying with us

Then, a corner in town.

Through Círculo, a regenerative tourism project, came Casa Oro, the hostel with the most history in town. The other four houses grew around it, all within walking distance in San Juan del Sur.

Wherever you stay, everything else comes with it: the shuttle to Maderas, the surf lesson, the turtles, the chocolate tour and breakfast at all five houses.

We use hospitality so that San Juan del Sur and its land come out ahead.

Your home in San Juan del Sur. And everything else.

Pick a house, or message us and we'll help you choose. A person from the team will answer.

See the housesMessage us on WhatsApp