The Realtors Association of Maui (RAM) released their Official June 2011 Maui Real Estate Statistics earlier this week. There was only one more sale reported above and beyond what I had included in my Unofficial June Stats. The one additional transaction was a land purchase which brought the monthly land sales total to 13 and raised the land median from $288,000 to $299,000. The RAM stats also provide community level granularity and some historical perspective with monthly stats running back until January of 2006. The one component of the official stats that I have been keeping a close eye on is located in the monthly overview. RAM has been tracking the inventory of homes, condo and land. It is pretty clear now that we have a trend of shrinking inventory. Inventories are now down 13-20% from the same time last year. We face the prospect of additional inventory reductions as Hawaii ACT 48 is likely to slow the pipeline of bank owned properties at some point in the future.
Being that we are at the midway point of the year, the June stats also gives us an opportunity to see how the market has performed at the halfway point compared to last year. Residential sales volume is up 4%, while the median home price is down 5%. Condo sales volume is down 3%, and the median price for condos is down 24%. Land sales are down 3%, and the median land price is down almost 30%. The RAM analysis believes that 2011 sales should compare better during the second half of the year as the first half of 2010 was bolstered in part by the first time home buyer tax credits. The first six months of 2010 condo sales were also boosted in large part by what I call the Honua Kai effect. I dubbed the term the Honua Kai effect to describe the bump in sales volume we have seen due to new developer sales that closed due to long term contracts dating back as long ago as 2005-2006. There were a few months this year where condo 2010 sales outpaced the same month in 2011 largely because of these long term closes. The Honua Kai closes also help account for part of the sharp drop in median prices for condos. All of these new development closes were well above the median sales price. That helped boost last year’s medians. While there have been continued decreases in condo values over the last 12 months, the drop is not as steep as the median condo sales numbers suggest. With fewer new developer closes in the latter half of 2010, the Honua Kai effect will be less of a factor on medians and volume. Feel free to contact the Maui Real Estate Team if you have any questions on this month’s stats or if you need assistance buying or selling property on Maui.
