Mexico– A contract that guarantees land ownership, including a U.S. style of title insurance, is among the real estate mechanisms that the government of Baja California is offering to attract American investors.

Other amenities offered to investors in Baja are property-tax exemptions, low utility bills, and active participation in building recreational areas, said Baja government officials, who spoke at the Mexican Consulate on Wednesday to promote a real estate conference, the II Annual Baja California Meeting Point, to be held Oct.18-19 in Tijuana.

Development projects in Baja have increased in the last year to 4,000 units along the Mar de Cortés, including houses, condos and gated communities. This has generated an investment of about half a million dollars, according to Alejandro Moreno, Baja’s secretary of tourism.

Delgado Beltrán also mentioned added benefits for U.S. investors, such as evolving programs to link Mexican healthcare providers with counterparts in U.S. hospitals, affordable housing for workers and cheap labor. Moreno and Delgado visited Orange County to promote the event, sponsored by the Tourism Secretariats of five Mexican states – Nayarít, Sinaloa, Sonora, Baja California and Baja California Sur.

In its first year, the two-day meeting drew 850 international investors, and 64 panelists, most of them from California, the East Coast, Canada and Spain.

This year, keynote speakers will include Bank of Mexico’s Guillermo Ortíz and Mexico’s telecom mogul Carlos Slim. The plan is to attract an investment of about $1 billion, said Moreno.

With the support of the Mexican Consulate in Santa Ana, Baja’s Tourism Secretariat is planning to hold a real estate exposition in July in Orange County, where experts in the Mexican real estate industry will showcase their products and services. A location has not yet been selected.