Great Spaces: Own Your Own Hawaiian Resort

Own Your Own Hawaiian Resort

In this month’s Great Spaces, we learn what it takes to sell luxury properties in Hawaii.

by Devin Meenan

PROPERTY HIGHLIGHTS: Where: Lahaina, Hawaii Listing Price: $46,127,254 Features: An oceanfront section of the Kapalua Resort, the property stretches 10 acres, from the house to a courtyard and beyond. 10G internet mixed with fruit trees create a down-to-earth, yet modern appeal. This property also includes a conservation easement for local birds. Added Appeal: Five en suite bedrooms, two half bathrooms, three commercial washers and dryers, two full kitchens and a pantry with three commercial freezers. The property is within walking distance of local beaches and resorts. Who wouldn’t want to live in a Hawaiian resort? 9 Bay Drive, located in the Lahaina neighborhood of Maui, can offer you just that. Part of the Kapalua Resort, the property offers an amazing oceanfront setting. If that level of luxury isn’t enough, the house is also within walking distance of resorts such as Montage Kapalua Bay and The Ritz-Carlton Maui.

RISMedia spoke to the property’s listing agents, Roy and Betty Sakamoto of Sakamoto Properties, who not only explained their selling strategies, but also the state of the Hawaiian luxury market and how they keep up the “Aloha” spirit in their business transactions.

Devin Meenan: What’s the current state of the Hawaii luxury market and how has that affected your efforts in selling this property? Betty Sakamoto: One of the problems with the luxury market here is we have almost zero inventory for the first time in forever. We’ve had a lot of interest and a couple of people that could pull the trigger at any time, but that hasn’t happened. Roy Sakamoto: Overall the luxury market—$5 million on up—remains pretty strong. Inventory is a little weak, even in these luxury markets, but the demand is still there. We’ve got a list of people looking for properties up to $20 million, but we can’t find inventory to present to them. The market for local housing is starting to weaken, and lack of inventory plus rising interest rates has created an issue. One issue we have, and it’s not localized to Hawaii or Maui, is affordable housing. BS: That eventually is a problem in the upper end of the market because you need to keep creating an experience, bringing people here and having it be “welcome to Hawaii.” The Aloha spirit—you need the whole thing.

DM: What was the price-setting process for this property? RS: First of all, the uniqueness of the property—10 acres, oceanfront, in a world class resort…that alone is almost priceless. How do you figure out what that’s worth? We had a variety of appraisals and we took a median. Initially, we had it listed at $59.5 [million]. The owner has adjusted it, and now it’s starting to get lots more action.

DM: What’s your strategy for marketing the property? BS: We have a lot of people coming in shortly and we’ll definitely have them see it. They own properties here…[people] that could purchase something like this or spread the word. It could be somebody who has been here, they know the property and have talked about it. RS: Asia has been a big market for us. With Covid and so forth, travel has been restricted. We have a couple of Singaporeans, for instance, who have expressed interest, but travel restrictions are pretty stringent and they haven’t been able to travel for the last two years. So we’ve been hampered from a market standpoint with Asia fairly well closed down. We’ve done some articles, we’ve had some coverage in the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg and Robb Report picked up on it, and we’ve done some advertising in some luxury magazines and publications. I think one big source of leads that we’ve gotten has been through the Global Luxury Network of Coldwell Banker. At last count, we’ve had 350 inquiries off that exposure—just had one yesterday from Columbus, Ohio. BS: I think some of the wealthiest people, maybe coming to Hawaii in particular, don’t come here to show off wealth. You’ve got to treat everybody like a buyer, like a person part of an ohana—part of your family. Because that’s what people want to hear—they want to be part of a family. RS: What’s interesting, too, is we’re getting a little bit of corporate interest. We have two very large corporations that are looking at this as a possible area for having a think tank to send their top execs over and kind of isolate them. They each have their own bedrooms, can meet on a daily basis and just have their own private space. That’s a market we kind of overlooked, thinking it would be a wealthy individual [or] a wealthy family.

DM: What makes 9 Bay Drive a great space? BS: I believe that there’s nothing in the world like it. Nothing. On one side of it is the Montage resort— spectacular, great restaurants, everything you’d ever want. On the other side is the Kapalua Bay Villas. There’s a Ritz-Carlton you can walk to, and another restaurant and resort nearby, Napili Kai. There are beaches all along here—smaller, private beaches for the most part. RS: You’re on Maui, you know… what’s so bad about that? RE

For more information, visit https://www.sakamotoproperties.com/ betty-and-roy-sakamoto/.