Kauai Newsletter
Winter/Spring  2004

Aloha! and greetings from verdant Kauai.


This month, I have some very special news: my new website with search capabilities is up and running! Please go to silverpalmproperties.com , where you can search for the property of your dreams from your own desktop, AND find a vacation rental! Every property for sale on the entire island is included in the data base, and there's also an extensive list of vacation rentals with detailed descriptions, pricing information, and color pictures. I am just thrilled with the job my web designer has done on this site, and I hope you will be, too. If you have any suggestions or criticisms for me, please let me know. Happy hunting!

Here on the Garden Island we have had a mild winter so far, with temperatures in the 70s, mostly clear skies during the day and nourishing rains at night. But even here, where we are close enough to the equator that seasonal change is minimal, the rhythm of the seasons makes itself felt. Right now, eight nesting pairs of albatrosses are feeding their newly-hatched nestlings in the grass here in Princeville, two of them in a field right next to a condo construction project. Nothing seems to perturb these placid creatures, except if you approach too close they will clack their bills at you. How they love to fly, and such magnificent fliers they are! Yesterday the breeze was stiff, and on our evening walk, my husband and I watched them swoop and dive and circle around again and again above our heads into the wind currents. They weren’t going out to sea to catch dinner; they weren’t going anywhere except around and around, for the pure joy of it. Did you know you could call an albatross? Our very unscientific research suggests that you can.Twice my husband whistled to them and both times they circled around and hovered right over our heads, checking out those two overgrown goonies staring up at them from the ground.


We have also spotted quite a few whales spouting and breeching off the Princeville bluffs. They seem to have arrived early this year; we’ve been spotting them from the cliff since January, and usually we don’t catch sight of them until March.


Our human visitors seem to be arriving early, too, judging by the number of cars I see parked at restaurants and shopping centers and the number of people I’m meeting at my open houses during what is traditionally our off-season. Many of them are buying property here, while others are still kicking themselves for not buying last year, when prices were lower. Please don’t do that. Prices are a reflection of value, and as people react to the stresses of modern life, or as they think of retiring, they place greater value on beauty and stress-free living. Naturally, places that offer those qualities become more valuable, particularly in a place like Kauai, where the inventory of housing and developable land is in short supply. And we haven’t reached the peak Baby Boomer retirement years yet.


Despite the low inventory, Kauai led the neighbor islands in real estate growth in 2002-03. Sometimes sales occur before a property is listed, or on the same day. Another island-wide trend is that more people have been buying condos, narrowing the gap between condo and house sales. Here on the North Shore, all three new condo complexes built in the past couple of years sold out before construction began, and are still moving rapidly in resales. In Princeville, a total of 192 condos were sold in 2003, up from 164 the previous year. Average sales price went from $355,046 to $426,130. Home sales remained about the same at 70, with the price going from $516,548 to $663,534. And 53 parcels of land were sold, nine less than the previous year, at an average price of $428,630 to 2002’s $274,412.

For the month of December, home sales were up 22 percent over those of December 2002. The median North Shore sale price was $697,500.

Even with all the nesting activity on the part of homebuyers, Kauai remains green, and the amount of state-owned and undevelopable land ensures that much of it will remain so. Did you know that half the state park land of Hawaii is located on this island? There are also county parks, many of them beaches, and federal land, as well as large parcels owned by old Hawaiian trusts that have traditionally refused to sell. Former plantation land has opened up slowly. Indeed, developers and residents alike are clamoring for a simplification of the permitting process to allow some development, particularly of affordable housing, to be built. Our elected representatives are mulling over alternatives and trying to come up with a solution. I'm proud to report that the broker in charge of my own real estate office is about to start construction of 104 beautifully-designed affordable duplex units, all of them offered only to owner-occupants, for under $300,000 each. Needless to say, these Lihue-area homes are selling quickly

That’s all for now. Please feel free to e-mail me with real estate questions, and remember, the week before your next visit to the island, you may CALL OR E-MAIL ME and I’ll e-mail you appropriate listings. You can then sift through them and select the most promising so that you don’t waste precious vacation time wandering around open houses or running to last-minute showings. I'll be seeing you!

With warmest aloha,