Hawaiian home away from home

Canadians are one of the forces holding up Hawaii's real estate market and currently estimated to account for 10% to 15% of foreign buyers.

The main draw for foreigners seem to be in the $500,000 + luxury home and condo sector as many see this market as currently having good value with great future growth potential.

Sales volume has cooled off from its highs in 2005 and with the weak US dollar, many foreigners are buying up luxury condos and houses for investment and vacation homes.

One realtor comments, "Maui inventory is much more available and affordable. The period of "irrational exuberance" in the Real Estate Market is over for now. There has been a correction and the over inflated priced homes do not sell. The market seems to have stabilized in the recent months."

Final thoughts: A quick search showed vacation rentals in the $120.00 per night for a 2 bedroom 2 bath condo.

I looked around an MLS site and there are plenty of options for less than $300,000.

It would require more investigation but on the surface it looks like one could purchase a decent condo around the $200,000 mark and have tourists pay it off.

If you are interested in a vacation home in Hawaii it's worth looking into.

Metro Vancouver Housing Starts Spiked

By Derrick Penner
Vancouver Sun

Monday, March 10, 2008

VANCOUVER -- Metro Vancouver housing starts in February spiked almost 100-per-cent higher than the same month in 2008 thanks to a flurry of condominium projects in Vancouver and some main suburbs.

Builders started work on 2,446 housing units, according to Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp.'s February report, some 96 per cent more than the 949 units begun in February 2007.

And in a continuation of the affordability trend, multi-family starts outnumbered single-family-home starts by a ratio of almost eight to one.

"With apartments and townhomes being relatively less expensive than single detached housess, the demand for multiple-family homes will remain high in 2008," Richard Sam, a Canada Mortgage and Housing market analyst said in a news release.

Multiple-family starts totaled 2,174 units in February, compared with 949 in the same month of 2007. Single-family-home starts of 272 were nine-per-cent lower than the 299 started in February 2007.

For the first two months of 2008, the 3,778 housing starts are 47-per-cent higher than the 2,575 units that Canada Mortgage and housing recorded in 2007.
© Vancouver Sun

REM: Add to this 1,085 condos listed for sale on Craigslist and another 5,278 on MLS for a total of 8,809 condos on the market in Metro Vancouver.