After our fifth trip (in 23 years) to Hawaii in Winter 2010, we decided that it would be a great destination every year. The best day weather-wise in the Midwest (where we live) is a high of 80 and a low of 70, low humidity, sunshine, and a light breeze. There are on average 10-20 days like that in central Iowa. That describes nearly every day in Hawaii.
Some islands and some parts of islands are more rainy than others. The rainier the climate, the more plants, flowers, and waterfalls. But that also means higher humidity. We prefer the dryer climate on the Kona (west) coast of the big island. We get all the benefits of a moderate climate, more sunshine, and lower humidity.
The largest expense, and most nerve-wracking experience, of a Hawaiian vacation is choosing and paying for a vacation rental. We got a good deal on a hotel room on the big island, we had a fantastic condo in Princeville on Kauai (but paid quite a bit for it), and we had a fairly ratty condo in Kihei on Maui (trying to save money after spending so much on Kauai). So when we decided to go again in Winter 2011, we also decided two things:
We would try staying in one place on our favorite island for the whole two weeks to see how we liked it
We would spend a day or two "just looking" at real estate possibilities in the area of Kailua-Kona
When we got back home from Hawaii in 2010, I started running a saved search on hawaiis.com to see what kind of properties were coming and going on the market. Over the next 8-10 months, listings were mostly coming, and not many were going. And the prices were dropping. One unit I had put on my radar was listed in February of 2010 for 0,000 (way out of my price range). When it was still for sale in December of 2010, they dropped the price to 0,000 (a pretty dramatic drop!). And by the time we got to Kona in February of 2011, it had dropped to 5,000. While still a bit above my budget, it was getting close.
Hawaiis.com also hooked me up with a very nice realtor (Kurt Carlson), who listened to my needs and took us to a few condos right after we got there. We looked at the (now) 5,000 condo, but were very disappointed in the condition it and it's contents were in (no wonder it hadn't sold). There was one condo that caught our eye for 5,000, but we talked ourselves out of spending that much, and we pretty much decided owning our own condo in Hawaii was not going to happen.
We went about doing our vacationy-things (there is so much to do on the big island), and had a great time. When we only had a couple of days left, I happened to check the listing of the one that had caught our eye. The price had dropped by ,000 (37%) THAT DAY!
I spent Thursday morning tracking down Kurt and getting viewings arranged for that condo and one other that had just popped up next door to it for a similar price. We immediately wrote off the new listing, but spent over an hour in the original one, deciding that maybe the price had dropped enough that we could not resist buying it. After thinking about it over dinner, we decided to write an offer Friday morning.
Expecting a counter-offer to come back in a day or two, we lazed around, and started packing for the long trip home. So we were shocked when Kurt called back after three hours to say that our offer had been accepted! Is the current owner crazy? Are we crazy?
Price drops are so common now, hawaiis.com had to come up with a new category to tell me about in my email alerts - condos whose price had dropped. They are still dropping, so get out there a look!
Well, here we are at the end of March, about a week away from closing escrow on our own private little piece of paradise! I never would have dreamed it just two months ago when we were anticipating and packing for our trip.
Come stay with us and look for your own slice of heaven!
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