Betty Sakamoto: Aloha. Welcome to Betty’s Real Estate Corner, brought to you by Roy and Betty Sakamoto, Coldwell Banker Kapalua. We’re here again for Betty’s real estate corner to come up with whatever comes into our minds today. We drift a bit from real estate because it’s just kind of more fun, and we get more people to check in with us after to figure out what we were talking about. We’re going to drift a little today.
Roy Sakamoto: Well, totally unscripted. We have no idea what we’re going to talk about. But off we go.
BS: Off we go. I don’t think we’re ever going to get off Lahaina and what happened with the fires. The longer we go, the harder it is for so many people. It’s difficult for everybody. Even if you weren’t truly affected, it’s difficult. It’s just difficult for everyone who lives in West Maui.
RS: Yeah, we were all affected to some extent anyway. It’s a tough thing to come back from. The attorney general’s report was just released yesterday, and it’s a lengthy report. I’m going to print the whole report and go through it. Very, very interesting. I guess another report is coming out by the Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms Department. Hopefully, by the summer, we’ll have that report.
BS: What is that report supposed to be?
RS: Supposed to go back to the origin of the fire in West Maui. There’s been a lot of speculation that the drastic fire was a result of an earlier fire that wasn’t totally extinguished. The winds are blowing so darn hard. I’ve heard like 70–80 miles an hour, which is not quite hurricane-force winds, but still pretty high. Embers were flying a mile away and within an hour. They had the fire spread from the hillside down to the oceanfront in an hour. That’s amazing. That’s quite a distance.
BS: It is. We were at Kapalua, and we had been without electricity since early that morning. Way early in that morning.
RS: Right, yeah.
BS: It was a pretty overwhelming day for everybody. You could see, even from the distance, the red burning. At some point.
RS: In the daytime, you could see the smoke. We just kind of thought it was on the hillside above Lahaina.
BS: That’s right. We never thought it was actually Lahaina Town. From where we were standing or living, it looked like it was more up above Lahaina or up above Kaanapali even.
RS: Right, yeah.
BS: Yeah. It was pretty odd and difficult.
RS: Then at night we could see the red glow. We still thought it was just on the hillside.
BS: Yeah. Until we started learning a little by morning. Remember, we weren’t getting any television. We weren’t getting our phone calls.
RS: Right.
BS: Our cell phones weren’t working. We have a regular phone, which is just plugged into our phone. It wasn’t working, so we had no regular telephone service. We had no cell phone service. It was hard to know what was going on. I guess today, that doesn’t really matter so much. Maybe in the future, they’ll be able to and that’ll help a little bit. We knew for sure what was happening when somebody appeared at our door.
RS: Yeah. It was a little bizarre. We got up in the morning— kind of early normal time for us is 5:30 am.
BS: This was for something when I went downstairs.
RS: Yeah. We noticed cars parked on our street. One of the cars belongs to our very close friend. We thought, what the heck is he doing on our street? We went out and knocked on his door.
BS: Scared him to death.
RS: Yeah. Woke him up. He came on in. We had flashlights and lanterns set up. He clued us in on what had happened to Lahaina.
BS: We had two other cars with him. With dogs that had lost their home. He did not lose his home, fortunately.
RS: Yeah. It was quite a morning to wake up to that news. I guess the rest of the world knew what was going on, but people in West Maui did not.
BS: We started hearing more information somewhere along the line. Our cell phone would work, or at least mine, every so often. I would get a call from somewhere, either California or Buffalo, New York, where my family is. They’d be filling us in on what they were seeing. We had no idea what was going on. Our information was coming from California or Buffalo, New York, for the most part.
RS: For the most part, right. Here we are seven months plus downstream. Very little has been done. It’s been tough on the residents of Lahaina, West Maui. All of Maui, because the whole Maui economy has suffered.
BS: Absolutely. We’re at the stage right now where Roy has been working diligently on a project at Kapalua that will provide 50 homes, small modular homes, for people. They’re going to be dedicated right now to employees of the person that’s paying for everything that lost their homes. There are going to be 50 homes that are in the process of going up. It’s been a nightmare to get to this stage, but everybody agrees now. It is happening. They’re building them and somebody else is paying for it, which is great. Somebody who’s dedicated to the people who work for him and live in West Maui.
RS: Right. There are no federal funds, state funds, or county funds involved. It’s strictly being paid for by the owner of the golf courses at Kapalua. He was touched by this tragic event and wanted to do something to help the employees of the golf courses, as well as the citizens of West Maui. We were tasked with the job of getting these homes permitted, which was quite a lengthy process.
We enlisted the help of Daiwa House from Japan, who are huge modular home builders. With their help, we were able to get our necessary permits. We had our formal groundbreaking around a month and a half ago with the governor, the mayor, and the owner of the golf courses in attendance. It was quite an event.
BS: It was beautiful. It was absolutely beautiful. It was complete with everything that you would want to have at any Hawaiian blessing.
RS: Yeah. We had Kahu Wilmont Kaialiʻi, who officiated on the blessing. It was very touching. It was a tear-jerking. That was a start. What we’re doing is 50 homes, 20 two-bedrooms, 15 three-bedrooms, and 15 four-bedrooms on about a four-and-a-half acre parcel that used to be part of the village golf course at Kapalua. The ground has broken. A few homes have gone up. We’re looking forward to late July, maybe as late as mid-August, to have these homes ready for occupancy.
BS: They are great. The greatest part about it will be, that they’re small. There’s no question. We could live in one because we’ve lived in small places. We aren’t living in a small place right now. But still, we could do it. I know we could. One thing I thought was, in the morning when you wake up, and you have your kids there, you grab a cup of coffee, you go outside. It’s beautiful. It’s a golf fairway that’s going to be pretty crowded with homes. There are places where kids could hide and play and be a great game of hide and seek up there. You’d never find anybody. It’ll be wonderful. I mean, it’s beautiful. It couldn’t be any greater.
RS: I know. We’ve talked about it on the show before, and we’ll probably talk about it some more in the future. It’s quite an accomplishment once these are done. To see the smiles of the people who have been pre-selected to go into one of these homes makes it all worthwhile.
BS: That is amazing. A lot of the people will hopefully go in, but I’ve never talked to someone who’s planning right now. It will be really important, and people will do just fine. Again, it’s hard. People have been moving all over. They’ve been living in one room. Even though they had one furnished and the washer and dryer are kind of centralized, that would be the greatest thing in the world for all of us to have them right between the living room. Let’s say the kitchen is everywhere. You’d get your laundry done instead of having it down in the basement or upstairs where the bedrooms are. These don’t have an upstairs. It’s fabulous.
RS: These will come fully furnished, with beds, furniture, and even down to dishes and glassware. You’ll have a full kitchen, washer/dryer, and even a split system.
BS: I thought it was going to be small.
RS: Not the window mounted.
BS: Okay, that’s good. In any event, it has been really exciting for me that you’ve accomplished something.
RS: There has been a village. There’s been a lot of people involved and it’s been quite an effort. There are totally frustrating times. But we managed to work through all the pitfalls, all the nooks and corners of various county departments.
BS: Well, it took a lot of patience on your part. I don’t have that amount of patience.
RS: A big proponent of this project was Governor Green. Thank you, Governor Green, for all you did to assist us in this project.
BS: It’s been hard. My heart goes out to everybody, including the mayor and governor. It’s easy for people to blame anyone who’s been involved in politics. One of the things we have to do is to give some patience to the fact that we do have a new mayor, mostly. I would say it’s still a new mayor.
We have a new governor. It was hard. Maybe they didn’t get the information as fast as they should have, and all sorts of things happened. Everybody is doing their best and trying at this point to make things happen.
RS: Nothing like this has ever happened before. So, there’s been no roadmap to follow, and God willing, there won’t be another tragedy like this again.
BS: You’re right. I can’t even imagine it ever happening again. Everybody learned a lot. There are so many stories that we’ve all heard. Somebody made a mistake because they didn’t let somebody turn a certain way, or did this, or did that. You know in your heart that everybody was involved. The fire department, the police department, and the citizens who are out there helping, doing whatever they can do to save a life. To help people just move along.
RS: There were so many heroes out there. Unbelievable.
BS: Most heroes you’ll never, ever hear about. Except maybe at a family gathering of some sort, or at a barbecue. Anywhere, where somebody starts telling the story of what they were doing. What happened in this family was that they were able to assist, or get them out of cars. I never understood that in some cars, the heat kind of cemented the doors closed.
RS: I heard that.
BS: Yeah. It’s all a tragedy, but I guess we could go back to real estate.
RS: Yeah. As people can see, we’re not totally a real estate show. We love to chat about what’s going on in the Maui community. West Maui in particular, where our office is located in Kapalua. One thing for residents and homeowners of Lahaina, who lost their homes, if you are contacted by anyone wanting to buy your property, think long and hard about making a decision.
I know there are a few scammers. I call them scammers out there, trying to steal property at very low prices. Don’t make a decision just off the top of your head. While the money sounds good, we’ll get it right away. Talk to an attorney or accountant. Talk to us. You can always reach me, Roy, at 808-870-7060 or Betty at 808-870-7062. We’re not going to charge you for advice, so feel free to reach out to us. Or an attorney or accountant. Don’t make a rash decision and just say, “Wow, that sounds good. But I’m not going to sell and get the heck out”.
BS: When it’s done, it’s going to be worth more than it ever was. Being in Lahaina is going to become more prestigious than ever. Somehow, there will be brand-new homes. I don’t know how. I really don’t. I’m sure that somebody had a great home, but they also had a high mortgage and a high interest rate. They don’t know what’s going to happen. Again, talk to everybody, talk to the banker If you have to beg, do whatever. But hang in there because Lahaina will be stronger and better in the end.
RS: One thing, we’ve almost got a blank slate. We can plan Lahaina the way it should be planned. Looking forward to 1–5 years downstream. What our resident areas will look like, what the Front Street will look like. Are we going to bring back those cheesy shops and sleazy restaurants? I hope not. You know, it’s a chance for us to pull up ourselves by the booths and say, okay, this is what we want for Lahaina.
BS: But there were some great restaurants for being organized. None of them were sleazy because they weren’t.
RS: There are a lot of historical points of interest in Lahaina. Mokuʻula island, for instance, used to be the home of King Kamehameha at one time. Kind of diagonally across from 505 Front Street. A lot of history there. My understanding is that, since the fires, a lot of the natural springs in the area have sprung back up. That’s a real kind of chicken skin sign to concentrate on the historical aspect of Lahaina.
BS: There are a lot of people that have huge investments in their properties – plan to rebuild stores or whatever it is that they have.
RS: Yeah. It’s a historical district. Hopefully, we don’t get these high-rise, shiny buildings. There’s going to be a lot of planning needed, and a lot of community input. We have a segment of the community who is saying, let’s go back to farming. Lahaina used to be the Venice of the Pacific, with taro patches and bananas.
Never mind hotels, shops, and restaurants. It’s one side of it. Others say, let’s make a big shopping mall on Front Street. Somewhere in between as a happy medium. But it’s a great chance for Lahaina to have their future in their hands. Hopefully, all the residents will chip in with their thoughts. As radical as it may sound, you’ve got to be heard.
BS: You’re right. Everybody should be heard. Everybody that had a business there that they had strongly invested in should also be heard. I don’t know how you can take all the different people who have been involved, are involved, and want to be involved. It’s the same thing with all the rentals, the people who have lost homes that we’re renting or don’t have a home that is being moved from hotel to hotel. How do we take care of everybody? They didn’t even have an investment in Lahaina or in a home. They were renting a room, someplace. How much protection does that get?
RS: There was a lot of that. There was also multi-generational housing where grandpa, grandma, son, daughter, and grandson were living in the same place.
BS: And the great-grandchildren.
RS: Yeah. In a home, you could have 15–20 people living in there.
BS: That’s right. But that was a family.
RS: That was a family.
BS: That should always be supported.
RS: As we know, there were a lot of illegal ohanas. The garages were sealed up and put a kitchen in and rented out for whatever you can get a couple.
BS: A couple of thousand.
RS: Yeah. Whatever you can get. But again, that was a great chance to be able to plan the future of Lahaina and what we wanted to look like. We can take what was a tragic event and turn it around into something good.
BS: That will be a difficult time for everybody. If everybody’s heard, works, and realizes when that can’t work, whatever it is that you want, if it can’t work, and you hit that point, accept it. Everybody should be as protected as they can. Hopefully, their insurance companies will protect them. We’re not just talking about Front Street now, we’re talking about all the little neighborhoods. Hope that everybody ends up protected with their homes.
RS: Yeah. Lahaina was a multilingual neighborhood and had many different nationalities. A lot of them do not speak English very well. That was part of the charm of Lahaina.
BS: Absolutely. Hopefully, it will be, again. It’s vitally important.
RS: Totally.
BS: You grew up in a family where Japanese was spoken, you understand Japanese but don’t speak it so well. Why did you miss out on some Japanese lessons? Would you like to say that on the radio, possibly?
RS: Not really. At the time, baseball was pretty important.
BS: He could climb out a window. No, let’s not tell anybody about it. But a few people have heard now.
RS: No.
BS: It was baseball that was more important.
RS: I’m sure my sensei, my teachers knew about it. But right after the roll call, I’d be out the window.
BS: I’d take it that you take quite a few people along with you, possibly?
RS: Oh, absolutely. Had to have a baseball team.
BS: You needed the team.
RS: Yeah.
BS: Want to have any real estate talk? We’re done. Well, wait a minute. We’re down to the two-minute warning. Oh, why don’t we just talk in general about what’s going on?
RS: The real estate market is kind of interesting throughout Maui. Just checked this morning, and there are over 300 properties currently in escrow. That’s a good sign for a good, good market. Interesting. Over 300 properties are in escrow.
BS: West Maui?
RS: No, all over Maui.
BS: Okay.
RS: That’s a healthy sign. Sure, interest rates are not as good as we want it to be. Looks like they’re going to be coming down. There are still great opportunities to buy. In buying, you don’t have to have a fixed 30-year mortgage. Go for an adjustable, three or five-year adjustable mortgage. Your rates are much better. Your points are much better. The market should be improving in the next 3 to 5 years.
BS: Something without a prepayment penalty, preferably. That assumes that interest rates do come down, and they always do. You’ll be in a position where you can refinance at that time.
RS: Right. We’re always willing to help and talk to people.
BS: Okay. We’ve got Danny Couch back. Aloha from Roy and Betty Sakamoto.
