Blake and Deborah in Hawaii: The Cost of Paradise

I don't have a lot of exciting touristy experiences to write about because we've been concentrating on real estate hunting. With our offer on the vacant land in Hawi still in the works, we're continuing to look for alternative properties in case that doesn't work out. Hawaii is more like Mexico or some other developing countries in that nice houses can sit right next to junky ones. Yesterday we went to look at a cute litter fixer with a nice yard and an even nicer price, but next door were six barking dogs on short leashes and a big rusty shipping container parked in the back yard (probably full of more dogs). Across the street was a pig in a pen sitting right in the front yard. Another place sat on a ¾ acre lot next to a big, absolutely gorgeous plantation-style house, and looked really nice – and might still be a possibility – but it was only a couple lots away from a chicken farm replete with noisy roosters. The Big Island is largely rural and much of it is still zoned agricultural, so you have to be mindful of whether, for instance, you are downwind of a pig farm.

There are neighborhoods where you can avoid all the “riff raff” and potentially incompatible land use, but we're not really gated community type people, and those places are generally out of our price range anyway. Real estate in Hawaii is expensive. The Big Island is said to have the most affordable properties, which is partly why we're here instead of Maui, but even here $300,000 only buys you a 1000 sq ft fixer. It does help that prices now are almost half what they were at the peak of the real estate bubble in 2006. The market turned sometime in 2011, bounced along the bottom for a bit, and is now heading up again, which lends a sense of urgency to our hunt. If we don't buy something in the next several months, we might find ourselves priced out of the market again.

I should clarify that when talking about real estate prices I'm talking about the North Kohala area at the northern tip of the Big Island, which is where we are concentrating our search. There are places on the west (dry) side near Kona that are more expensive, and places in the rainy southeast Puna district where you can buy a lot for $5000 (although it may be covered in lava) or a house for under $100,000 (although it may be mildewy and riddled with termites).

Apart from real estate we've also been busy researching the cost of living here. The Kona area has all the budget shopping amenities including Home Depot, Ross, Target, WalMart, and, most importantly, Costco. Gas is more expensive at around $4.15/gallon, except at Costco where it was about $3.79 last time we filled up. Movie matinees cost $7.50. Sales tax is only 4% vs. 9% at home. Hawaii has the most expensive electricity in the country, and the Big Island is especially onerous with rates roughly four times what we pay at home. The good news is that all the sunshine makes solar hot water not just possible but common, and photovoltaics are becoming more widespread as well. Plus, if you live at a comfortable elevation (say, 500-1500 feet), you need neither air conditioning nor heating.

Prices for packaged foods are generally more expensive, but not too bad at Costco. Fortunately we eat mostly fresh produce and the farmers markets (and again Costco) are good affordable options for that. And with a year round growing season, many Hawaiians grow their own food. We looked at one house in Honokaa where the owner had orange, tangerine, lychee, avocado, papaya and macadamia nut trees growing in his yard. He sent us home with a bag full of fruit. We were tempted to buy the house for that alone. Here at our tiny cabin in Hawi I can walk out into the orchard in the morning and pick a couple of tangerines for our breakfast. A couple of days ago we came across a papaya tree in a vacant lot and helped ourselves to three big ripe ones. Mango trees are all around, but unfortunately the fruit is not in season right now. It is encouraging that with a little home farming and local foraging skills, you can feed yourself quite nicely for very little money. And when all else fails, you can just go to Costco and make the rounds filling up on the free samples.