Maui's Great Community Charities & 2021 Graduating Class

Maui’s Great Community Charities & 2021 Graduating Class: Betty’s Hawaii Real Estate Corner on KAOI

Home » Betty’s Hawaii Real Estate Corner » Maui’s Great Community Charities & 2021 Graduating Class: Betty’s Hawaii Real Estate Corner on KAOI
May 20, 2021
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Betty Sakamoto: Aloha and welcome to Betty’s Real Estate Corner brought to you by Roy and Betty Sakamoto, Coldwell Banker Island Properties. Here we are, we’ve got another day with Betty’s Real Estate Corner. We have been driving over together Roy and I have come up with so many different ideas.

Roy Sakamoto: But you didn’t do your dance.

BS: I know because I was busy. I sang but I think I was cut off. You didn’t get to hear me.

RS: Yeah

BS: Whoa, that was a good thing but I am dancing inside. I do love Danny Couch.

RS: Yeah.

BS: We’ve got to find him when we go to Honolulu.

RS: Absolutely

BS: He was here once and did really great a couple of times. Part of the Luau for Hale Makua and we raised a lot of money. He is singing every song, he danced with people, he was so fun, he was wonderful. He had someone in his family that also I think worked at Hale Makua at the time or had worked at Hale Makua.

RS: Yeah, he had some contact there.

BS: One of the nicest men and such a fabulous entertainer. We got to see him soon.

RS: When he sang songs from Phantom of the Opera, remember that?

BS: Oh yes. He actually almost starred in Phantom of the Opera in New York. There was a change, he got tied up on something else and ended up not doing it but he can sing the Phantom of the Opera songs as good as any celebrity that has done them in the past.

RS: No question.

BS: Danny Couch, unbelievable.

RS: Little chicken skin.

BS: Yeah, it is a chicken-skin moment.

RS: Yeah

BS: He is pretty great. We are going to do real estate today. I think we are going to miss Norm Estin today. I forgot to ask him for a call, I wish he was checking in with us. We saw him yesterday and still, he seems to have really great hope on and on about the number of people that are getting vaccinated and how really good it is for our island and the whole state of Hawaii. I think Dr. Estin continues to keep the move to keep people getting vaccinated and to see to it that we all survive this pandemic and come out on the other side unscathed, hopefully.

RS: Yeah. A big question is and not to get away from the subject but the Olympics coming up in Tokyo.

BS: Yes

RS: Big controversy. I guess, they just started vaccinating in Japan, and even though most of the world’s athletes are getting vaccinated it is going to be interesting.

BS: When are the Olympics?

RS: The summer.

BS: Did you know the dates offhand, no?

RS: July I think.

BS: Is it July?

RS: Yeah

BS: You have to hope for the athletes that they do get to do their sport. That they do happen no matter what because you know that time for each man, each woman that’s been planning this. If it doesn’t happen it gets to never happen. That’s got to be the most difficult time in any athlete’s life. You know, World War II stopped the Olympics at one time.

RS: Right.

BS: Then there was some other reason that they…

RS: We actually have a friend, a fellow realtor not with Coldwell Banker but a fellow realtor, good guy Rohn Stark who qualified for, I forget the year of the Olympics. I think Rohn was in the decathlon and the US decided not to go because it was going to be in Russia and was the Russian boycott.

BS: Yes, that’s again a tragedy.

RS: Yeah, bummers.

BS: Now, he had a great career in the NFL.

RS: Yeah

BS: An amazing realtor Rohn Stark.

RS: Yeah, good guy.

BS: You got to love him, wonderful family man, a great person but that had to have been the most stunning disappointment that you could ever have imagined for any of those people that lost out because of that.

RS: No question. Anyway, let’s talk about some charities around town.

BS: Oh, we should talk a little about Hale Makua right now I think.

RS: Yeah, Hale Makua. Last week was actually nursing home week. In honor of Hale Makua “Happy nursing home week” for Hale Makua.

BS: Also the first time that people got to hug their loved ones as long as. What was the rule there? That they had to have already been vaccinated?

RS: Right, yeah.

BS: How did it work? I think you have heard more of it than I have.

RS: Well, for a long time they had no visitors at all unfortunately so a lot of face timing with residents and family who are off-campus. It is hard not to be able to touch and hug your loved ones. Anyway, now we are open again, and hopefully, we will stay open at Hale Makua.

BS: Well, I think there was a lot of hugging and kissing and everything that went on yesterday.

RS: Right

BS: Is what I have heard and that had to have been one of the most tear-jerking emotional moments for everyone that works at Hale Makua. Everybody was involved certainly for the people that had been unable to touch or be in the same room basically with their loved one.

RS: No question. I want to single out one of the Hale Makua employees, Joyce Della. She recently obtained her family nurse practitioner license. Congratulations Joyce! She actually started in Hale Makua in 2014 as an LPN. A licensed practical nurse and worked her way up to RN and home health client care manager and now is the interim home health administrator for Hale Makua. Congratulations Joyce, fantastic.

BS: Joyce is someone that really cares. Obviously, she is been at Hale Makua for this lengthy period of time and has kept working to better herself and better her community and take care of Hale Makua and its residents, so important. What an amazing woman.

RS: While we are on the subject of Hale Makua. There is a benefit golf tournament on July 24th at the Blue Course in Wailea. July 24th and you can get information on this, go to the website halemakua.org. If you are interested in playing or just donating halemakua.org.

BS: It will be a great golf tournament. Looks like they’ve got a really fun format. I don’t remember all of the details.

RS: It’s a scramble so everybody will have a chance to participate and have fun. BS: Scrambles are always fun. Anybody who plays golf kind of knows that one. RS: Right

BS: You just have to do a couple of things and you can be the hero.

RS: Yeah

BS: The hero of the day and the worst golfer on the course but it works that way.

RS: Yeah

BS: It’s fun

RS: How about the Maui Food Bank as another fantastic charity organization here.

BS: Yeah. We were reading something today that says, that for every dollar..

RS: There’s yeah, two meals.

BS: It will provide two meals.

RS: Right

BS: I mean, that’s really says a lot for our whole community because that’s got to mean that there are so many contributions. Many people are stepping up to see to it that they do give something. The Maui Food Bank has participated I am sure in every single food drive that’s happened.

RS: A fantastic organization.

BS: It is.

RS: Yeah and their website is mauifoodbank.org. I can’t think of a more worthwhile charity than Maui Food Bank.

BS: No, I can’t. Over the last year, we have driven by the Kahana Citizens Chapel or Citizens Church.

RS: Citizens Church, yeah.

BS: There have been just hundreds and hundreds of cars that have tied up between Kahana and Kaanapali totally full on the edge of the road. When we first watched it and you thought about it and the people in what it had to all these are people that we all know more or less. It’s our community and to have to be out there had to be so difficult for people. It took the Maui food bank and the churches and everyone. Let’s all keep remembering the Maui Food Bank. Nobody in Hawaii should be hungry.

RS: Absolutely, mauifoodbank.org. Check out their website and contribute what you can whether it’s $5, $10, $30, $50 whatever.

BS: There’s been a lot of things recently where they say a dollar. If everybody gave a dollar it certainly adds up. I think that is a great statement for almost all of us. Once you’re on that website if you give what you can and like you are saying whether it’s $5, $20, a $100’s. I think it is one of the best charitable organizations to be able to help our community today.

RS: Right

BS: Really matters.

RS: Remember every dollar supplies 2 meals to someone.

BS: Yeah, that’s really huge.

RS: Fantastic.

BS: Any other real estate we want to do today?

RS: On a later note though, High School graduation season.

BS: Lahainaluna High School graduation is Sunday.

RS: This Sunday.

BS: I believe they’re going to light up the L. We are going to try to at least go down to Lahaina and get parked someplace that we can watch it just because I think ever since Julie graduated there for me. My daughter and I got to see that L and the kids and the tears and the leis. It’s really one of the most touching moments ever.

RS: With the lighting of the L or the torches at the L it looks like the L is on fire.

BS: It does, absolutely.

RS: Look at it from Lahaina.

BS: And at the same time they are singing the class Alma Mater.

RS: Yeah

BS: That really is very touching. The kids sing it in Hawaiian. My understanding is that as a freshman at Lahainaluna you learn to sing the Alma Mater in Hawaiian.

RS: That’s mandatory.

BS: It’s mandatory which is really pretty great and then the football team sings it all the time and they sing it in the proudest greatest voices of all time.

RS: Yes, they do.

BS: Your classmate really worked with a lot of people on the alma mater.

RS: That’s right. Lori.

BS: Lori, yeah. She is so great and I think she still is helping with the group.

RS: I think so.

BS: I think she does. I don’t think she’ll ever quit.

RS: No.

BS: Lahainaluna and all of the schools’ graduates of 2021.

RS: Congratulations! All the high school seniors, fantastic job. May your careers blossom in front of you and we are looking to see what you bring back to Maui.

BS: I hope so and remember that you missed a lot this year and it’s going to be difficult. I think you are going to have that to hang on to and know that you’ll have made a difference in so many ways. The class of 2021 is going to look back on something that no other generation has had to do. Well, generation the class last year certainly had the same difficult time. Again, they are going to bring back something that other classes will never have an opportunity to do. Remember that you stood up, you graduated. You maybe didn’t get to walk the line the way you expected to but you were all proud. Last year at Lahainaluna up on the highway or what we call in Lahaina a highway the police were there they took care of everybody and the cars were all over the place and horns ablaze and music playing and leis flying. Everybody was in their cars and the police had pretty much stopped all traffic except High School traffic. It was spectacular.

RS: Yeah and we were in a zoom presentation of scholarships for Lahainaluna this past week. Congratulations to all the scholarship recipients. Betty and I have a Roy and Betty Sakamoto renewable scholarship for a graduating senior. That’s renewable for 4 years depending on your grades but we are happy to contribute and do that.

BS: We also are not really picky about the grades.

RS: No.

BS: I definitely was not the top student but I did a lot of things. I am proud of my High School years. I think, that it really is important that they get the help no matter what. Our feeling was always that we were fine if the recipient was not an A student maybe not even a B student but we’re happy to have any student that really is looking to go on to college. In the same thing in continuing a lot of our kids in Lahaina and Maui in general even though they are going to college they don’t have a lot of help. They might still be taking care of brothers and sisters and having a lot of other things that they have to do. When we are helping them let’s be patient. Let’s not feel like, “Hey! only A is work, B’s and C’s work just as good” and eventually a degree is a degree. It will get you a nice job hopefully and hard work will get you there also.

RS: Yeah and it’s been fun since we started our scholarship program. We have had 3 or 4 actually graduate from college and it’s such a great feeling.

BS: At least 3 or 4 now. We better count that up one of these days.

RS: I know.

BS: As something to be really proud of because it has been great and then the other sad thing really in a way is that every year the presentation of the scholarships is done at the school. All the kids are there, the graduates and a lot of their friends are thereby then most everybody knows who the recipients are going to be. Their parents are there and their grandparents and they get to go up on the stage and whoever is giving the scholarship has leis for them. It’s a really great presentation and a really exciting moment. Again, in the last 2 years, everybody has missed out on that. There haven’t been any leis but the other day they did a really great zoom type thing.

RS: Yeah

BS: Where the kids got to thank whoever gave them the scholarship on a zoom call. They all did a really spectacular job. Mostly nobody else was on it. A few people did a short thing because we wanted to also describe the Charley Pride scholarship.

RS: Right

BS: And kind of tell people what that was a little bit about. It was really pretty fun thing and each of the kids looked great and they were thrilled.

RS: They were.

BS: As thrilled as if they got their leis and the cheering of the crowd and everything. They were really great young people.

RS: So

BS: So

RS: On to real estate.

BS: Okay, let’s do a little market. What’s going on? Not as many deals going into escrow right now.

RS: No, but it’s still a very active market. Interest rates are still unbelievably low and we are off the 800 level now as far as escrows and Maui but still high 700 and good inventory is getting slimmer and slimmer.

BS: It sure is.

RS: Yeah

BS: It still is possible for someone even looking to own a home here to buy? You know, prices are high and it’s a little scary because what goes up this quickly could easily come down a bit but that is because interest rates are still so great and rentals are getting so high. If you are looking for a first-time home it’s still possible to pull it off and that the interest rates will really make it work for you.

RS: Well, I think what makes it work for a lot of people too is to upgrade. To get a larger home may be in a different area. Call us (808) 870-7062 for Betty, (808) 870-7060 for Roy and we’ll certainly help you and point you in the right direction.

BS: One of our people Elizabeth Quayle has really done a phenomenal job with first-time home buyers and people trying to get in the market. She’s done a little bit of everything and we’ve watched her also do Oceanfront homes and million, multi-million dollar properties. She really is a great person. Totally knowledgeable in that market. She can be reached at (808) 276-6061, Elizabeth Quayle. She is also a very great helpful person to get you started.

RS: Great resource.

BS: Great resource.

RS: So, you’ve got a good listing there I see.

BS: I do. We got Marcy Rhody has won a great listing in Kaanapali Hillside, 13 North Piki Place. Listed at a $1,965,000, 4 bedrooms, 3 baths. It’s got everything and appears to have, I haven’t actually seen this one myself but it does have an ocean and a mountain view at the end of a cul de sac. Great landscaping, lots of amenities, a short walk to Kaanapali beach, etc. Got a little bit of everything Kaanapali Hillside.

RS: Yeah

BS: Couldn’t be a better location.

RS: What was Marcy’s number?

BS: Oh, Marcy’s number is 280-2255. Marcy Rhody (808) 280-2255. Nice listing there Kaanapali Hillside.

RS: Yes and here’s one at Pineapple Hill at Kapalua, it’s a 102 Wood Rose. It is listed by Roy and Betty and it’s a 3 bedroom, 3.5 baths. It is about 3,800 square feet. Awesome ocean views and I just did a printout this morning. We have had on this listing 231 agent hits online and 195 prospective clients hits.

BS: It is amazing right now the number of people that are getting to us from our website which is sakamotoproperties.com. Sakamoto p-r-o-p-e-r-t-i-e-s plural dot com. Check that out it will get you into the whole MLS system. You can find anything that’s available. Know whether it’s under contract, what’s happened on it, etc. That’s a great way to get in and just look at things and we don’t ever try to track someone that’s been on our website.

RS: No.

BS: We just let you go around and if you want us you’ll call us.

RS: Or send us an email. Thanks to Meyer Computer, they’ve really set us up with a great website sakamotoproperties.com and call us (808) 870-7060 for Roy and for Betty (808) 870-7062.

BS: Another thing on our website you can find all of the radio shows which has been really interesting to me because Meyer Computer has recorded all of the radio shows put it on our website. You can locate it there. I think that’s amazing by itself because people have found some of the radio shows that we’ve done. We recorded a few things about great restaurants in Maui and a few other things like that. We just kind of did a little talk story moment, a couple of different, and we’re going to be doing that again shortly.

RS: Yeah

BS: I think, that’s really fun and people find it, look at it. They’ve been intrigued by what we’ve got to say.

RS: Absolutely

BS: And it was really fun to do.

RS: It’s fun and again thanks to Meyer Computer for setting this up for us.

BS: I guess also if you need a website, you can go to Meyer Computer.

RS: Yeah, absolutely.

BS: meyercomputer.com

RS: Yeah

BS: They are really the best.

RS: Not to get off real estate but we had a fun time last evening talking about restaurants and shows and so forth. We hadn’t seen George Kahumoku’s show for years. I know George was shut down during the pandemic but we were able to get to his show last evening and it was fantastic.

BS: At Napili Kai.

RS: Yeah

BS: It’s really great. What was that? Oh! excuse me, I’m sorry I’m not paying attention here. They are giving me a 3-minute warning. I’m not facing the right way so it’s pretty funny all of a sudden. Everybody’s now giving me the 3-minute warning.

RS: George is the true Hawaiian renaissance man.

BS: He was amazing.

RS: Yeah and we had a chance to chat with George afterward. Check out his website kahumoku.org.

BS: He was great.

RS: .com I guess. Kahumoku.com

BS: Probably .com but really great show. Roy’s right we haven’t gone for

years and it’s so close to where we live.

RS: Yeah

BS: We could have gotten there and we just haven’t. Now, I feel like we could go once a week I mean whenever it’s there.

RS: It’s there every Wednesday night.

BS: Yeah

RS: 6:30 to 8:30 and George has this fantastic farm in Kahakuloa.

BS: He loved talking about the farm last night.

RS: Fantastic. Grows all kinds of vegetables, fruits, livestock.

BS: Has a horse, a miniature horse.

RS: Horses

BS: Yeah

RS: Whatever. I guess he doesn’t sell or able to give away. He donates to the Maui Food Bank.

BS: That’s right.

RS: What a gesture.

BS: Another nice thing about George. I mean, that was amazing to learn what he’s been doing for the community.

RS: Yeah and he was talking about somebody wanting to have him plant trees as part of a nature conservation project and so forth. George says he’s not interested in planting trees just for tree’s sake but if the trees produce fruit yeah count him in. They have planted something like 10,000 trees so far something like that.

BS: That’s amazing.

RS: Yeah, all fruit-bearing. All kinds of different fruit trees. Thank you, George, big Mahalo to you and what you do for the community.

BS: There are so many people here that it’d be hard to ever even begin to think about you know telling you the number of people that we’ve met or we know even just the number of realtors that step up in the community. Everybody does their part here. There’s almost nobody in Maui that isn’t willing at some point to do something.

RS: Yes. The realtors association does the backpack buddies, remember?

BS: The backpack is right. They say that in Maui a lot of people don’t believe that every day a certain number of children go hungry. They don’t have enough food and people don’t believe that. I now believe it and these guys are doing a great thing. We are down to the 1-minute warning. Remember stuff like that, that there are kids in Maui that are still hungry. Let’s support the Food Bank and people like the buddies system that the realtors are working on. That gives a backpack to a kid to take home every night or every weekend so they have food. Danny Couch is back, I love Hawaii. Let’s all plan to dance it out.

RS: Absolutely

BS: I love Hawaii.