ISLAND LIVING
Mauna Lani Ranked in Top 10 for Hawaii Golf Resorts by Condé Nast Traveler
Mauna Lani ranks in the Top Ten Hawaii Golf Resorts by the readers of Condé Nast Traveler.
Kohala Coast, HI – The
Mauna Lani Resort has been featured as one of the top ten Hawaii golf resorts in the April 2011 issue of Condé Nast Traveler. The list includes 125 top golf resorts.
“We are thrilled that the Mauna Lani Resort has been recognized by the readers of Condé Nast Traveler again. The Mauna Lani Golf Course is consistently recognized as a top Hawaii golf destination, and it is one of the reasons that we are excited to be building our flagship community here,” says Jeff Prostor, President of Brookfield Homes Hawaii. KaMilo, a gated community of 137 single family and paired homes, is located alongside the Mauna Lani North Golf Course.
The Mauna Lani Resort is also the only US property to be honored as one of the world’s “Top Luxury Eco-Friendly Beach Destinations” by Condé Nast Traveler. Its progressive solar system generates the most solar electric power of any luxury resort in the world. Preservation of the area’s natural resources is an important part of the resort experience.
“It’s an ideal location for golf enthusiasts as well as those who are thoughtful of our environment. The combination of ideal weather, spectacular views, natural preservation, and a consistently top-ranked golf course make this a great place to vacation and live,” says Prostor.
Brookfield Homes Hawaii currently offers the only community of new homes being built along the Mauna Lani Golf Course. A designer furniture package of up to $50,000 is being offered for a limited time on select homes currently in construction. Visit www.brookfieldkamilo.com for details about this offer.
About KaMilo at Mauna Lani
KaMilo at Mauna Lani is a joint venture resort community between Brookfield Homes Hawaii, Inc. & A&B Properties, Inc. Award-winning Brookfield Homes Hawaii, Inc. offers luxury resort communities on the Islands of Hawaii including KaMilo at Mauna Lani (Island of Hawaii), Nihilani at Princeville (Island of Kauai) and PiliMai at Poipu (Island of Kauai). Brookfield Homes Hawaii understands the unique resort lifestyle and the signature design aesthetic of the Hawaiian Islands.
A&B Properties, Inc., a subsidiary of Alexander & Baldwin, Inc., is one of Hawaii's largest private landowners. Alexander & Baldwin, a Hawaii company operating in the Hawaiian Islands for over 140 years, is involved in land development, agriculture and ocean transportation.
Lower prices drive rebound in resort home sales
Higher demand and improved buyer confidence also helped the boost
By Andrew Gomes email agomes@staradvertiser.com
POSTED: 01:30 a.m. HST, Apr 28, 2011
Buyer demand for Hawaii homes broadly rebounded last year, and a new report shows that the same was true for one segment of the state's housing market: resort residences.
Sales of condominiums and single-family homes — new and previously owned — as well as house lots at master-planned resorts such as Wailea on Maui, Mauna Lani on Hawaii island and Princeville on Kauai ended a four-year slide with a 42 percent surge to 1,473 properties last year from 1,040 the year before.
The surge was in line with home sale increases for all homes on the neighbor islands, where gains last year ranged roughly from 20 percent to 60 percent. Most resort home sales were on the neighbor islands as opposed to Oahu, where the rebound for all home sales last year was closer to 10 percent.
The report by local market researcher Ricky Cassiday of Data@Work said the rebound in resort home sales was aided by improved confidence among buyers and the slow economic recovery, though the big driver appeared to be lower prices.
"No way around it," Cassiday said in the report. "This strong rebound in activity is thanks to dramatically falling prices."
The average sale price was $1.1 million last year, down 14 percent from nearly $1.3 million the year before.
Cassiday's report said the average peaked in 2008 at nearly $1.6 million, which put the cumulative decline since then at 29 percent.
It's uncertain whether prices will rebound this year. The 2009-10 price decline was a record. The previous record drop for resort home average prices in Hawaii occurred in a single year, 1977, when the average fell 27 percent, according to Cassiday.
Cassiday said Hawaii's resort home market this year likely will either see prices stabilize, which could slow sales, or further price drops that would help sales continue rising. He said he's betting more on prices rising slightly.
Last year, many resort home sellers were dropping prices. In other cases, lenders were pricing property attractively after foreclosure.
Cassiday's report said 9 percent of resort home sales last year were foreclosures that sold for an average $737,343 compared with an average $1.35 million for nonforeclosure resort home sales. A report by RealtyTrac released earlier this year said 11 percent of all home sales in Hawaii were foreclosures last year.
Another factor in the average price decline has been developers cutting back on building high-end homes amid the economic downturn.
Developers sold 371 new resort homes last year, an 11 percent decline from the year before, the report said.
The divergence helped pull down the average sale price for all resort homes last year, as the average new home sold for $1.5 million compared with $971,277 for the average previously owned home.
Cassiday expects developers will have a smaller share of resort home sales this year if buyer demand grows ahead of home production by cautious developers slowly resuming construction.
In some cases, developers are offering incentives to spur sales.
Earlier this year, Castle & Cooke tried auctioning all its unsold inventory of resort property on Lanai. The company offered 11 homes and three lots, and ended up selling five condos at Manele Resort for close to $1.2 million each on average, or about 80 percent of the price for the most recent previous sale at Manele last year.
Last month, Brookfield Homes Hawaii publicized efforts to sell three golf course homes in its KaMilo subdivision at Mauna Lani with prices starting at $799,000. Last week, Brookfield announced an incentive of up to $50,000 in free designer furnishings for buying select KaMilo homes before May 15.
According to Cassiday's report, there were 386 sales last year at the least expensive end of the market, between $250,000 and $499,000. At the high end, there were 358 sales for properties of more than $1 million.
Near the height of the market in 2006 and 2007, there were about 150 sales under $500,000 in each year compared with about 800 sales over $1 million.
$1.1 million. The Valley Island has held the top spot since at least 2006. The average on the Big Island was $704,328, followed by $465,369 on Oahu and $428,690 on Kauai.
Maui also had the most sales at 562. Hawaii island was next at 401, followed by Kauai at 345 and Oahu at 162.
Real estate: It's time to buy again
After four years of plunging home prices, the most attractive asset class in America is housing. Nationally the inventory of new homes is at an all time low.
Mike Castleman, the founder and CEO of a company called Metrostudy, has spent over 30 years tracking real estate activity and the nation's inventory of new homes.
"I'm a dirt-road economist who sees what's happening on the ground, and in 35 years I've never seen a shortage of new construction like the one I'm seeing today," says Castleman, 70, in this cnn article. "The talking heads who are down on real estate will hate to hear this, but America needs to build a lot more houses. And in most markets the price of new homes is fixin' to rise, not fall."
http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2011/03/28/real-estate-its-time-to-buy-again/
Hawaii Real Estate News - Dec 2010
Getting Off The Fence - Sales Are Up for 2010
The Realtors Association of Maui & Hawaii Information Service are reporting their statistics for 2010 which indicate that Maui, the Big Island and Kauai will likely finish out the year with higher sales volume and generally lower median prices.
For November 2010 on Kauai the number of single-family homes sold increased by 74%: up to 40 S.F. homes sales for the month versus 23 for the same period in 2009, according to Hawaii Information Service.
Exceptional improvement was seen on Kauai in the resort markets including Hanalei/Princeville and Koloa/Poipu. In Hanalei, there were 11 sales in November up significantly from 2 sales in the same period of 2009. In Koloa, there were 12 sales in November 2010 compared with 6 a year earlier. In Kauai's condominium market the number of sales last month was up 6 percent to 17 from 16 a year earlier.
For the first 11 months of the year, Kauai single-family home sales were up 41 percent to 316 from 224 during the same period last year, while the median price was up 5 percent to $475,000 from $453,000.
Condo sales on the Big Island last month were up 8 percent from a year ago. The median price was up 11 percent. Big Island condo sales year to date were up 57 percent to 458 from 291 a year earlier. Median prices however were down slightly.
Best of the Big Island (Series 1)
There are thousands upon thousands of travellers who use the internet to share their experiences about Hawaii. Rarely, do you find someone who has the opportunity to do it professionally. We found someone who does just that, very well!
Travel writer, John Fischer, of About.com, has dedicated his time to exploring the pacific and writing about all the places he recommends to travelers. Like us, John is huge fan of the Fairmont Orchid in the Mauna Lani Resort. This world-class hotel is located in the coastal Mauna Lani Resort offering awe-inspiring sunsets, spectacular golf courses, and fine dining.
The Mauna Lani Resort also offers residential communities for those who fall in love with this place and never want to leave! KaMilo at Mauna Lani is a new development in the resort offering all the luxuries of a hotel but without a check out date!
Check out more of John's recommendations for the Big Island of Hawaii. Among his series of articles, he has compiled a list of exciting things to do for free on the Big Island and who doesn’t love that?
They say it's getting better... what do you think?
The Department of Business, Economic Development & Tourism (DBEDT) has released a 4th quarter report for 2010 that indicated that Hawaii's economy is expected to continue positive growth based on the most recent development in tourism industry, labor market, and real estate conditions.
The recovery will be broad but modest in degree. This news is encouraging for residents of Hawaii as well as those who are own or plan to purchase real estate in our island state. It is great to read report such as these that tell us, as consumers and business people, which direction the economy is moving in. However, the question is, do YOU agree?
Kauai sees gains in home sales volume, pricing in August 2010
It is a welcome report from the Hawaii Information Service for the Island Of Kauai; Kauai Real Estate showed overall positive results for the month of August 2010.
The Garden Isle saw increases in both number of sales and median prices of condominiums and single-family homes in August when compared to the same month last year, according to the Hawaii Information Service.
Kauai Sales for August 2010
Single Family Homes: 31 sold (Eight more this same time last year)
Condos: 23 sold (Eight more than last year)
The median price of single-family homes in Kauai was $607,500 in August, up from $471,000 in August 2009. The median price of condos in August was $334,000, up from $313,000 a year ago.
Read more: Kauai sees gains in home sales volume, pricing in August - Pacific Business News (Honolulu)
Hawaii Real Estate News
"Now is the time to buy!"....
Economists hope the worst is over for Hawaii's housing slowdown. Real Estate firm Distinctive Homes Hwaii held a mid-year Hawaii Real Estate update and discussion on Wednesday July 28, 2010. Economist Paul Brewbaker says low interest rates are helping the housing market continue a slow recovery.
"At some point rates will probably begin to rise again, so the window of opportunity is finite. It may only last for another year or so," said Brewbaker.
5 Steps to Investing in Real Estate
Hawaii Business News recently published a helpful article by independent investor and author Kim Kiyosaki about the key steps to entering the real estate market. Kiyosaki purchased a single rental home in 1989 and has 2,000 today. She shares some of her experience by identifying the 5 major steps she feels are key to realizing success in real estate investing.
Here’s how she did it. 
http://www.hawaiibusiness.com/SmallBiz/June-2010/5steps-to-Start-Investing-in-Real-Estate/
