Maui Real Estate Shows Signs of Slow Recovery

The end of 2009 was about as good for Maui real estate as the beginning of the year. The number of units sold was down overall, although there was a slight improvement in the number of condominiums sold. Still, house sales have taken a major hit and condo prices have fallen considerably. While single-family house prices have not fallen as much, they’re still down almost 15 per cent.

Nevertheless, available inventory appears to be declining suggesting that there are some reasons to be cautiously optimistic about a real estate recovery in Maui. At the moment, there are still more than enough properties to satisfy the market for the next year or 18 months and since said inventory continues to include a wide variety of short sales and bank-owned properties the picture is not entirely rosy.

In other words, now is not the time for sellers to test the waters. The market is fairly saturated with highly motivated sellers so unless you need to sell your home you should wait for further market improvement. Dozens of new foreclosures every week help to maintain this buyers’ market.

Current selling prices tell the story fairly accurately. The average price for a single-family home in Maui is down to $713,946 in 2009 compared to $830,578 in 2008, more than a $100,000 difference. Moreover, prices in 2007 were higher still averaging $920,807 making the total drop in average price more than $200,000 in just 2 years.

Similarly, condo prices have also suffered. In 2009, the average condo sold for $719,993 compared to $920,468 in 2008. Condo prices have fluctuated much more than single-family home prices as 2008 prices were considerably higher than those the year before. In 2007, the average condo price was around $817,000 but we can still see a drop of about $100,000 for condos.

Even median prices have shown a decline. Typically, median prices are consulted in order to exclude rare sales and inexplicably expensive houses. Regardless, the median price for single-family homes in Maui has dropped more than $160,000 since 2007. The median prices for these properties were $630,069; $577,774; and $498,106 for 2007, 2008, and 2009 respectively.

And the statistics for condos are not really any better. Since 2007, condo prices have fallen $100,000 from their 2007 and 2008 medians of $550,000 to the 2009 median of $450,000. However, even though these are disconcerting figures, it’s important to understand that the Maui real estate market is doing considerably better than the national picture. According to experts, the average single-family home sold for $172,600 in November 2009.

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