Hawaii Real Estate Resource

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Foto Friday--West Maui Backside

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Photo of cliffside road on Maui's North Shore

No room for guardrails, just drive, don't look, and don't meet an oncoming car.  No flats allowed.

Photo of cliffside road on Maui's North Shore

Oops, Maui-style traffic jam!  The car on the right is backing up as there is no room to pass on this cliffside road.

 Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550

Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.comfor Hawaii real estate information 

Foto Friday-Kahakuloa

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Photo of Old Kahakuloa Village on Maui's North Shore

Entering Old Kahakuloa Village

 

Photo of Kahakuloa "restaurant"

 Fine dining and the ONLY dining near Old Kahakuloa Village

 Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550

Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.comfor Hawaii real estate information 

Golden Domes on Kauai

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Kauai Hindu Temple Photo

I had a delightful experience today when I "stumbled across" a tour of the Hindu temple being build above Kapaa on our little island of Kauai.  Granite slabs are being hand-chisled in India and shipped 10,000 miles to Kauai for the construction which has been ongoing since 1991.  The gold leaf dome overlays are stunning in the bright Kauai sunshine.

 Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550

Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.comfor Hawaii real estate information 

Sea Water Air Conditioning

A new type of air conditioning system is planned for downtown Honolulu that will be a major energy saver.  A local company has plans to install underground pipes running from the ocean into downtown Honolulu so that sea water can be used for cooling instead of refrigeration systems.  The system is slated to be operational by 2011 with savings of around 75% on the electric bill.  With Hawaii's cost of electricity being 3 times the national average, this is a very big deal.

Some challenges remain such as getting past potential public opposition which is always a possibility when change is happening.  The Environmental Impact Statement is due to be filed this month.  Source of this information is our local publication Pacific Business News.

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550

Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.comfor Hawaii real estate information 

Annapolis Revisited

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Annapolis photo

Annapolis Maryland photo from my recent visit to see my new grandchild, Zoe.  In the Summer, there is nary a vacant spot along the seawall.  It's still quite picturesque without them.

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550

Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information 

Kauai Real Estate Status Snapshot

A snapshot of Kauai real estate listing inventory is shown below.  At what I hope is the bottom of our market, it will serve as a basis of comparison for future updates.

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Kauai chart

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550

Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information

Maui's Distressed Market Share

Some areas of the nation are seeing short and REO sales in such large numbers that they are the majority of all sales, I recently published a chart for Kauai showing distressed sales are only 1/4 of the market there.  On Maui they are a little higher at almost 1/3 of overall sales in the month of September.  That is still substantially less than the worst areas of the country.  What remains to be seen is whether we have escaped the worst or whether it just hasn't arrived yet.  I have joined the Keller Williams Realty short sale and REO team so as to be prepared in case it's the latter while hoping that it isn't.

Data below is based on agent reports for September which are not audited for accuracy.

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Maui pie chart

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550

Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information

Kauai's Distressed Market Share

Some areas of the nation are seeing short and REO sales in such large numbers that they are the majority of all sales, On Kauai they were only about 1/4 of our overall sales in the month of September.  What remains to be seen is whether we have escaped the worst or whether it just hasn't arrived yet.  I have joined the Keller Williams Realty short sale and REO team so as to be prepared in case it's the latter while hoping that it isn't.

Data below is based on agent reports for September which are not audited for accuracy.

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Kauai pie chart

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550

Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information

Kauai Sales Price Points Update

Kauai residential sales price points continue to move out of the lowest bands with the increase going to the $500K to $750K band.  This suggests that our market is recovering from bargain basement prices early in the year when 2/3 of sales were below $500K.  We're still a long way from what we were seeing at the peak of the market in 2006 when less than 1/4 of sales were less than $500K.  One day we shall return to those price ponts but I'm not prescient enough to say when that will be.  Hopefully there will be many who will be buying homes before that happens.

Currently (2009 Price Points Through September)

Price Points Chart

 

Previously (2009 Price Points Through February)

Price Points Chart

 

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550

Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information  

Kauai "Seasonal" Real Estate Market for 2008

Having published data on Kauai "seasonal" closings averaged over the last 8 years, I though it would be interesting to see if current market conditions have caused any variation.  As in the other chart, our "slow" season for closings continued to be the Winter months for 2008. 

Kauai sales chart

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information 

 

Kauai "Seasonal" Real Estate Market

As one of the few states where "season" is based more on tourism than on climate, it's interesting to note that our 4 slowest months are the Winter months of November through February.  This mirrors what I have heard about the mainland market but perhaps with somewhat less prounounced differences.  The "Wagonwheel" chart below shows our closings by month averaged over the years of 2000 through 2008.  Our biggest month is March which may be due to year-end visitors who decide to buy while they are here.  The chart follows...

Wagonwheel Chart

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information 

Kauai Sales Fishhoook

Looking at data back to 2000 shows that Kauai sales took a huge tumble indeed beginning in 2006.  But that fishhook upturn in 2009 is looking an awful lot like a new trend!  Stay tuned for the next few months to find out for sure.

Kauai sales chart

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550Richard T. Dolbeare (RA), Keller Williams Realty logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information 

Kauai Sales Stats For September

Kauai home sales statistics have been released for the month of September 2009. The figures are island-wide comparisons of current sales versus year ago periods. Monthly values fluctuate widely and I've always preferred to use year-to-date data to average out the fluctuations. Both are presented below.

It's important to keep in mind that the data reflects what is actually selling and not necessarily a change in value of a particular property. In my experience investor purchases tend to be in higher-priced resort areas whereas owner-occupant purchases tend to be more focused in value-priced areas. My buyer clients today are much more heavily weighted toward owner-occupant than in previous years when investors dominated. More sales in value-priced areas and fewer in higher-priced resort areas will drive median sales prices down. Of course the number of sales speak for themselves although here again, an absence of investor sales will drive the numbers down.

Number of Sales

Type September % Change   Year-To-Date % Change
Single Family Homes 15 -29%   168 -26%
Condominiums 14 +75%   114 -21%

 Median Sales Price

Type September % Change   Year-To-Date % Change
Single Family Homes $499,000 -5%   $470,500 -25%
Condominiums $337,500 -32%   $330,000 -41%

Additional breakdown of this information is available to my clients upon request.

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550Richard Dolbeare (RA), Century 21 All Islands logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information 

Foto Friday--Olde Tyme Phone

I doubt that too many remember using these kind of phones.  They were wall-mounted and had 2 large dry-cell batteries inside.  The hand crank alerted the local switchboard operator that you wanted to make a call.  She sat in front of a switchboard with cables everywhere and plugged them into the correct sockets so that you could talk to another party.  I'd say my Blackberry is one giant leap for man (or is it mankind?).

Our operator was Floy.  She was the only one so worked 6 days a week.  Calls were not allowed after 8 PM or on Sunday as she needed a little time off to eat and sleep and such.  I even remember our phone number which was 45R4 and it would ring 4 times so that we knew it was for us and not someone else on the party line.  In retrospect, I'd guess the number probably stood for line 45, ring 4 times.

What fun!

 photo of wall phone

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550Richard Dolbeare (RA), Century 21 All Islands logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information 

Kauai Sales Are Up

Having once managed an engineering data department, I'm accustomed to pouring through numbers and presenting data in charts for easy visualization of market activity.  Today I'm relying on a less rigorous measure of market activity here on Kauai.  When I reviewed our MLS daily summary, I was amazed at how different it looks from just a few months ago.  Today we had a whopping 7 sales closed and 2 contingent contracts.  Just a few months ago we were lucky to have 1 sale and often had none.  Back then, most daily reports were not much more than price changes down.  Today, that category made up only 1/3 of our activity. 

Clearly buyers are buying once again and more and more signs are pointing to a recovery.

Aloha!

Search Kauai/Big Island | Search Maui | Email | About Me | Visit Website | Phone/Text (808) 651-4550Richard Dolbeare (RA), Century 21 All Islands logo

Engineering Hawaii Dreams Today--Helping Buyers Find Dream Homes & Sellers Find Buyers

Visit www.KauaiRocks.com for Hawaii real estate information