Maui Real Estate Market Update Q1 2022 Vol. 4

Topics

Eye Catching Numbers From The February Stats, Interest Rates and More

This week’s market musings takes a look at some of the notable numbers from the February sales statistics and the latest on interest rates. Without further ado…

Notable Numbers from The February Stats

The Realtors Association of Maui recently released their February 2022 statistics. These are some of the numbers that I found particularly noteworthy.

  • New inventory decreased for homes and condos 6.7% and 17.3% respectively compared to February 2021. This speaks to Maui’s continued inventory crunch.
  • Pending sales for homes and condos dipped by 27% and 31% compared to last February. This is in part due to a lack of inventory and in part because the period between February and April of 2021 were the busiest in Maui’s history for closed transactions. For these same reasons, I surmise you will see similar year to year decreases in pending sales throughout the rest of the Spring.
  • The days on market for homes increased just than 1% compared to last February. On the other hand, condo days on market dipped 46.8% compared to last February. While some of this is due to a particularly strong condo market, this can also be traced to a divergent home and condo market during 2020. Home inventory decreased throughout 2020. Condo inventory, and vacation rental condo inventory in particular, increased throughout most of 2020. It only started to trend down towards the end of the year after the reopening of our tourism economy in October. There was a pretty healthy inventory of condos with higher days on market to start 2021. As a result, many of the early 2021 sales had pretty high days on market. In 2022, there are a lot fewer condo listings sitting around for long before going under contract.
  • The median sales price of single family homes and condos increased 18.3% and 31.2% respectively. To be clear, these numbers do not directly reflect changes in property values. Changing values do influence median sales price. However, the median price is also influenced by the composition of the properties sold. We touched on estimated price increases since the start of Covid in Musings Volume II. Across a variety of properties, we saw values increases between 28 and 46% over the last two years.
  • Single family home inventory decreased 25.6% compared to last February. Condo inventory is down 71.3%. Again, this goes back to the differences of inventory to start 2021. The condo market had a pretty healthy supply of condos for sale, while the home market entered the year with far fewer condos. Relevant to the here and now, inventory levels remain really low for both homes and condos.
  • Two markets stood out for an increase in activity. Both the Kihei and the Napili, Kahana, Honokowai districts saw big increases in condo sales. Vacation rental condo sales drove the increased activity. Sales of Kihei condos that allow vacation rentals are up 32% this February compared to last February. Sales of Napili, Kahana and Honokowai vacation rental condos were up a whopping 93.75%.

Interest Rate Watch

After flat to declining interest rates, the 30 year fixed rate jumped above 4% for the first time since 2019.

This is a resumption of the upward trend over the last six months. Rates dipped with the start of the war in Ukraine as investors shifted from equities to more secure bonds. Mortgage rates tend to generally follow the ten year treasury bond. A subsequent sell off in bonds due to news on inflation and future fed increases allowed rates to increase again. While the gradual increase in rates is forecast to continue, some economists predict that global uncertainty may dampen the rate of increase in mortgage rates this year.

My posts can’t be all numbers all the time. Chances are if you are reading this, your interest in the island extends beyond real estate. You appreciate Maui’s people, natural beauty, flora and fauna. With that in mind, I thought it was worth sharing this short video from earlier in the week. Here is one of Maui’s most famous winter visitors being saved from an entanglement of fishing gear.

Contact The Maui Real Estate Team

That’s it from this week’s Market Musings. Contact us if you have any questions about the market, requests for content on future posts or of course need assistance buying or selling property on Maui.

About The Author

Subscribe to Our Blog!

* indicates required
Related
More posts
Table of contents