January 2011 E-Mail Update

This is my 1/11/11 E-Mail Update. I send out an Update each month after the statistical data for the proceeding month from the Board of Realtors has been posted on their website. For newsletter mailing months like January, I also wait for our newsletter to be posted on our website at stott.com where it can be downloaded. To be removed from the distribution list, hit reply and send me an e-mail stating that. Please include your first and last name to make it easier for us to locate you in our database.

As expected, year 2010 showed considerable improvement in the Oahu Housing Market when compared to last year (2009). However, before we uncork the champagne, it’s useful to look at the past several years, which reveal that 2008 and 2009 were relatively poor years compared to 2006 and 2007. Closed sale of houses over the past five years were: 4,991 (06); 3,611 (07); 2,738 (08); 2,690 (09); and 3,051 (10). The median sales prices of houses were $630,000 (06); $649,000 (07); $620,500 (08); $575,00 (09); and $592,750 (10). The median or midway sales price is routinely used in price comparisons rather than the arithmetic average (mean), as the median is not biased by unusually high or low sales prices. Closed sales of condos (high rises & townhouses) were: 6,234 (06); 6,184 (07); 4,080 (08); 2,690 (09); and 3,051 (10). The median sale prices of condos were: $310,000 (06); $325,000 (07); $325,000 (08); ($305,000 (09); and $305,000 (10). http://tinyurl.com/4vfxtc5 is a link to a 1/11/11 newspaper article that provides information on various areas of Oahu.
The University of Hawaii Research Organization recently forecast that Oahu’s median home prices should rise between 4% and 5% in both 2011 and 2012. Two factors that may impact upon these projections are an increasing number of foreclosures and rising mortgage rates. The following numbers reflect annual foreclosure filings in Hawaii over the past five years: 955  (06); 1,381 (07); 2,077 (08); 3,101) 09); and 3,954 (10). As for mortgage rates, we’ve gotten off the phenomenally low rates that existed a couple of months ago. The rates are still marvelously low but certainly likely to increase over the next couple of years

Hawaii’s population increased by 12.3% over the past decade, a gain of almost 150,000 since the 2000 census. With the recent census of nearly 1.4 million, Hawaii overtook both Maine and New Hampshire to become our 40th most populous state. It now has more residents than Maine; New Hampshire; Rhode Island; Montana; Delaware; South Dakota; Alaska; North Dakota; Vermont; and Wyoming, our least populous state . . . For the third year in a row, the Obama family vacationed over the holidays in a house on Kailua Beach about a mile from the house where Mary Lou and I have lived for over 30 years. The house the Obama family stays at is at the end of the sandy beach, which makes sense from a security viewpoint; however, the accumulation of seaweed when the tide is incoming makes it a very poor section of the beach, at times, for swimming.

Republican governor Linda Lingle who left office in December after two four-year terms as governor is considering her various options. She says that she is going to take six months off before deciding what to do. A likely possibility is a run against Democratic Senator Daniel Akaka in 2012 who has stated that he intends to campaign for a fifth six-year term. Lingle, 57, could be a formidable opponent for 86-year-old Akaka.
On Wednesday, January 12th a new ABC medical series began titled “Off the Map.” Oahu plays a South America jungle in the series that focuses on doctors who are battling their own “personal demons” and have chosen to hideout in remote jungle villages. The doctors soon learn that their patients may require a different type of medicine from what the doctors left behind and that they will have deal with the jungle elements including jury-rigged medical equipment if they want to save lives. Thirteen episodes have been ordered of the mid-season, replacement show. ABC hopes to be able to duplicate the success they had with  “Gray’s Anatomy” another medical series that originally started as a mid-season replacement in 2005 in addition to their excellent, six-season, jungle-oriented-run on Oahu shooting “Lost.” One of our administrative assistants has a minor part in the “Off the Map” pilot.

Looking Back at 2010

by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser 12/31/10 (with some editing)

1. Elections: Neil Abercrombie, a fiery liberal, was elected the state’s seventh governor in surprisingly easy victories over former Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann in the Democratic primary in September and Lt. Gov. James “Duke” Aiona, a Republican, in the November general election. The 72-year-old Buffalo, N.Y.-born Abercrombie made the transition to chief executive after four decades as a legislator in the state House and Senate, the Honolulu City Council and Congress.

Former Honolulu Prosecutor Peter Carlisle won the special election to replace Hannemann as Honolulu Mayor. State Senate President Colleen Hanabusa beat U.S. Rep. Charles Djou, R-Hawaii, to reclaim the 1st Congressional District for Democrats after Djou won a special election in May to serve out the remainder of Abercrombie’s term in Congress.

Following the elections, the Democrats held the Governorship, all four Congressional seats, the Honolulu mayoral seat, 23 out of 24 state senate seats, and 43 out of 51 state house seats

2. UH sports/Mountain West: A collective sigh of relief could be heard from Manoa to the Mainland after the Mountain West and Big West conferences offered the University of Hawaii a home for its teams. In 2012 the football team will be a part of the MWC in football with most of the other sports joining the Big West. It won’t be cheap. Travel subsidies paid by UH could top $1 million per year, but it sure beats the alternative of remaining in the crumbling Western Athletic Conference.
UH officials deserve plenty of kudos for being proactive in seeking out alternatives. Had Hawaii remained in the WAC, it is likely that having a Division I athletic program might have been history by the end of the decade.

3. The Honolulu Star-Advertiser: The consolidation of Honolulu’s two largest daily newspapers this year catapulted the combined product, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, into the nation’s No. 2 spot for market penetration. By that industry measure the Star-Advertiser is second only to the Times Leader of Wilkes-Barre, Pa.

The Star-Advertiser, the largest daily in the state with an average daily circulation of 128,000 (135,000 on Sunday), published its first issue June 7. The consolidation came as a result of Gannett Co.’s decision to end nearly four decades of newspaper ownership in Hawaii and sell The Honolulu Advertiser to Canadian-based Black Press, owner of longtime rival the Honolulu Star-Bulletin.

The two papers had competed for more than a century; however, the last decade had been especially contentious as they, like newspapers around the country, lost advertising share. Some 453 jobs were lost in the consolidation.

4.  Tourism: Hawaii’s visitor industry began turning around in late 2009, but performance took off in mid-2010 and is expected to continue rising. Travelers responded as airlines added flights to Hawaii and hotels continued their deep discounting. For the first 11 months of 2010, arrivals rose 8.6 percent to 6.45 million visitors, and visitor spending rose 16 percent to $10.3 billion. Visitor spending rose by double digits each month after May. Hawaii tourism is expected to finish 2010 with just over 7 million visitors and expenditures of $11 billion. While those results are good, there is room for growth in 2011 given that arrivals are still 8 percent from their 2006 peak and spending is off by 14 percent from 2007′s peak.

5. “Hawaii Five-0″: Few shows on television have arrived with as much marketing buzz and fan anticipation than this fall’s CBS reboot of the classic crime drama “Hawaii Five-0.”

A glossy tropical postcard shot in HD, “Five-0″ reinvented its core characters, gave them high-tech equipment and armed them with comedy to win the ratings war. By midseason “Five-0″ was the No. 1 new show of the season.

6. State employee furloughs: Teacher furloughs on classroom instruction days, which became a national embarrassment, ended this school year after state lawmakers and Gov. Linda Lingle agreed to tap the state’s hurricane relief fund and local bankers put up a line of credit if necessary.

Gov. Neil Abercrombie, on his first day in office, chose to release all of the hurricane relief money set aside by lawmakers, not just the portion Lingle wanted, so the line of credit from bankers has not been used.

Teachers and many other state workers will continue to take furloughs through June to help with the state’s budget deficit, just not on classroom instruction days. Furlough Fridays have become the most visible symbol of the state’s response to the recession.

7. Civil Unions: Gov. Linda Lingle vetoed a bill in July that would have allowed same-sex and heterosexual couples the ability to enter into civil unions and receive the same rights as married couples under state law.

The Republican governor called the bill “marriage by another name.” She suggested that state lawmakers put a constitutional amendment on the 2012 ballot to let voters decide the issue. The veto came after an emotional debate over civil rights that spread over two sessions of the state Legislature. The state Senate passed the civil-unions bill with a veto-proof majority, but the state House did not, so no override session was called.

Gov. Neil Abercrombie has promised to sign a civil-unions bill into law if passed again by the Legislature.

8. “Lost”: For six years Hawaii was the backdrop of one of the most mysterious settings in television history: the island in ABC TV’s mega-hit “Lost.” The show had won legions of fans ever since the pilot aired in 2004 when an ill-fated flight from Sydney to Los Angeles crashed onto an island with menacing smoke monsters, evil residents and more convoluted plot turns than a maze.

When ABC screened the first episode of the final season at Sunset on the Beach in Waikiki in January, more than 12,000 fans attended.

9. Kahuku football: Saint Louis might be the state champions in prep football this year, but there are many who believe the real No. 1 team resides in the North Shore community of Kahuku. Acting on an anonymous tip, Kahuku’s administrators discovered a seldom-used player was ineligible academically, resulting in the Red Raiders forfeiting their season.

Kahuku defeated Saint Louis earlier in the year, with both teams anticipating a possible rematch in the state championship. The courts ultimately decided that Kahuku had to abide by Oahu Interscholastic Association bylaws that led to Kahuku forfeiting all its games. But the real loser was the entire state, deprived of another epic showdown between Saint Louis and Kahuku at Aloha Stadium.