Hi RK,
Ok, you got me curisous now, I have looked it up and read some foreign real estate sales reports about it, from people who have never been like usual. It certainly is not only minutes from the city, perhaps 15 minutes to the tip of the city areas but to any areas within the city for tourism, shopping, business, being in the city areas of Iracema, Meireless, Mucuripe and Adelota towards the city beaches, then you are definately over 30 minutes at very very best maybe 40mins from an educated guess. The Parque Dourado is set much further back in land to the city than the already estabilished and middle class area of Eusebio. Eusebio takes 20 minutes to the main city areas when the main roads a quiet, but often 30 minutes. Again its not near the beach I ll say about 20minutes at best to around Dunas/Aquiras beach being the nearest. As for safety in that area, I dont know, I havent been to this perticular area but I can ask around for you, but it is something else that you need bear in mind.
Permission for build can also be misleading, developers can often say this and be telling you the truth but with out giving you the full truth, developers need alot more than a simple town hall permission believe me! sometimes certain licences can take many years, especially if they are problems with land documentations which is often the case.
As for the price, 360M2 is a very small plot and in a undeveloped area £10,000 is alot of money, you can get that in Eusebio if you are looking for real growing Brazilian middle class residential areas, and Eusebio is already developed, growing, and nearer to all things. You can even get beach front for a little more £££s and more distance to Fortaleza, but in some great areas with infrastructure close by and amazing beauty all around.
I m not trying to scare you off, Brazil can be a fantastic investment, I m just trying to correct some sales exagerration and with Brazilian states being so big and diverse that choosing your investment area is so important to get the better investments. Parque Dourado may well come off to be decent investment area in the future, but what are the chances you need to think about. Investing is much about risk assessing. Yes your only talking about £10K here or so but investments terms were are talking about potentially much more of a differance so it is very much worth spending a grand or so on 2 or 3 week s out here, visit Joao Pessoa if thats also an interest (I actually know an English Lady who has lived there most of her life who works in real estate who can help you also) talk to Michael about things in Natal and certainly visit Fortaleza, you ll love it, and always best to compare places to get the real picture of things.
Regards
Paul