Lynda Gill’s Poipu, Kauai, Hawaii Real Estate at Pacific Ocean Properties

Fierce Storm Pounds Kauai

First time I was able to get out of my house in over 24 hours! View on my street, taken at 3:15 p.m. on Sunday.

At 2:30 a.m. on Sunday our phone range with a civil defense warning about flash flooding for the island of Kauai, but the storm had already woken us up.  Fierce thunderclaps and pounding rain had continued from Saturday late afternoon to build itself into an all out massive storm by the time we got the call on Sunday morning.  As I write this, Sunday at 3:05 p.m. I hear for the first time birds chirping and the rain has stopped with some thunderclaps, it seems the worst is over.

A surface and upper level trough (or area of low pressure) is destabilizing our atmosphere and pulling up moisture from the deep tropics.  This trough is west of Kauai so we are getting hit the hardest.  It is already weakening and our typical trades should return by Wednesday.  The National Weather Service has extended the flash flood warning for the island of Kauai until 3:45 p.m. on Sunday.

There were sewage spills in Ele’ele, road closures all over the island, landslides and boulders in the road all over the island, heavy flooding in Kekaha and the Poipu Beach/Waiohi parking lot and the lower end of Kaui road near the beach had significant flooding.

I stayed at home all day Sunday here in the Kiahuna Golf Village where I live.  There were some some power outages but they were super brief.  Just lots of rain and weather to stay home a blog by!!!

Kauai Real Estate 

The weather did not slow sales down any.  We had a huge amount of properties that went under contract last week, very busy for offers being made and accepted.  The number of properties that came on the market was pretty low.  A couple of notables was a unit that our office listed at the Kiahuna Plantation (LH) unit #402 is a Garden View 1 bedroom 1 bath on the ground floor for $199,000.  Also a Kuhio Shores (FS) unit came on the market  and three days later it was under contract.  The price on the Kuhio Shores ocean view unit was $489,000.  I can remember, and not that long ago, when the Kuhio Shores units were not selling in the mid $350,000′s!  Now that inventory has cleared out and a new, and higher, price point has been established.

For a list of what came on the market, went into escrow and sold CLICK HERE FOR SPREADSHEET

Koloa Camp Offer Denied

Koloa Camp is in the news again.  I last wrote that Peter Savio, an Oahu developer, had offered Grove Farm the assessed value for their Koloa Camp land with the intent to let the residents stay in their homes and to pay for the project with a scaled down development plan for the rest of the land. (see blog posting Koloa Camp Offer )

The Vice President  of Grove Farm rejected the offer.  Koloa Camp was known as “Japanese Camp C” and is the last sugar plantation camps in existence on our island.

Grove Farm does not have their permits yet and plans to go ahead with the eviction.  Some residents of Koloa Camp are vowing to stay even if the police are called.  One resident has been working with Councilwoman JoAnn Yukimura on a draft for a resolution that could provide an extension for an eviction date while an alternative solution is sought after.  State Senators have also called some of the residents asking if there is anything that they can do.

Initial Unemployment Claims Drops 15% Statewide

The number of initial unemployment claims in Hawaii fell by almost 15 percent year over year last week, according to the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism.  All four counties saw decreases, with Oahu seeing the greatest decline in number and Kauai experiencing the greatest percentage drop.

Oahu:  Down 11.1%

Big Island Down 22.1%

Maui Down 5.5%

Kauai was the big winner down 37%

Visitor Spending Up By 13.9% In January

January started out year off positively with a 13.9% rise in tourism spending.
A total of 643,616 visitors to Hawaii spent a collective $1.3 billion in the Islands in January, numbers that exceeded the HTA’s initial performance targets by 5.4 percent and 7.7 percent, respectively.

Hawaii Tourism Authority credits the double digit growth to “other Asia” market, which includes South Korea, Taiwan and China, and Oceania, which includes Australia and New Zealand. Specifically, those markets were up 20.1 percent and 31.7 percent, respectively.

Sears In Ala Moana Shopping Center To Close

Sears announced the sale of 11 of their stores to General Growth Properties for $270 million.  Of the 11 stores one is is the state of Hawaii and that’s the Ala Moana store in Oahu.  The Sears (and Kmart) here in Kauai were not on the list.  The store is expected to close in 2013.