Vacant Land Diversity on Maui – 5 Current Hawaii Life Vacant Land Listings

In the three-part blog series, 11 Things to Investigate Before Buying Vacant Land on Maui, I promised that we would start to explore real vacant land listings on Maui. We all know that there is huge diversity on Maui, despite being a relatively small island. In this blog, 5 Hawaii Life vacant land listings are highlighted to explore this diversity. As of August 29, 2019, at noon, all 5 of these listings were in Active status.

Using the criteria from 11 Things to Investigate Before Buying Vacant Land on Maui, here is a quick snapshot of the listings:

In order to make the comparisons meaningful, we needed to hold one variable constant. The variable being held constant is size; all five lots are in the 2+ acre range. As you can see, all five listings are in different regions of Maui, some are oceanfront and no surprise their price points differ accordingly.

Maui Vacant Land For Sale

Here are the links to all five listings for your reference:

• 21 Lahaole Place, Wailuku (Central Maui) – 2.42 acres — $425,000 – MLS# 382066
• 45 Ahinahina Place, Kula (Upcountry Maui) – 2.22 acres — $650,000 – MLS# 382970
• 850 Kai Huki Circle, Haiku (North Shore Maui) – 2.69 acres — $1,600,000 – MLS# 382746
• 63 Kuahulu Place, Oluwalu (West Maui) – 2.21 acres — $3,995,000 – MLS# 372292
• 0 Makena Rd, Makena (South Maui) – 2.79 acres — $6,500,000 – MLS# 378831

The two first items in the table are location and price. How many times have you heard that real estate is all about location, location, and location? Please see the following map to see their relative locations:

Purchasing real estate is also about your budget, and you can see the different list prices on the map. I suspect that for many of you, you have eliminated one or more of the listings already. Isn’t that exactly how we buy real estate, we see what is available and begin to eliminate until we get down to those few listings that are real candidates?

Next is size, which we mentioned is our constant variable so we can highlight the other differences in the lots.

Four of these listings are zoned ag, so in this case, the owner would need to adhere to the ag regulations for building. The fifth listing is rural, so there are a slightly different set of rules, the two biggest being no farm plan and you can build two accessory dwellings (aka ohanas or cottages) in addition to the main dwelling.

None of these listings is a CPR. Even though I told you in the previous blog series that I am not a fan of CPRed lots, this was not done on purpose; it just turned out this way when I selected these Hawaii Life listings.

Four of the five listings are or will be part of an HOA, the only one that is not is 45 Ahinahina Place, Kula. 21 Lahaole Place is part of Maluhia Country Ranches that has an HOA fee of $433 per quarter. 850 Kai Huki Circle, Haiku is part of Pe’ahi Farms with a monthly HOA fee of $550. 63 Kuahulu Place, Oluwalu in the Olowalu Makai subdivision and this has a $856 per month HOA fee. Finally, 0 Makena Rd, Makena is part of Big Beach Estate, and there may be an HOA in the future.

In my humble opinion, the first utility you should ask about is water, hence the reason it was highlighted in the table. As you can see, three of these lots are serviced by a private water company, and two of the lots have a county water meter. For the three that are serviced by a private water company, I would recommend that during your due diligence period that you carefully investigate the water company to ensure you are comfortable with how it is being managed and operated.

We have now gotten to the fun part. How many of these five listings are still on your potential list?

Ocean Views

All five of these lots have ocean views, and very different ocean views.

• 21 Lahaole Place is located at about 1050 feet above sea level (all elevations are based on information from Google Earth), and this lot has ocean views, plus views of the North Shore of Maui from the Harbor east and Haleakala.
• 45 Ahinahina Place is located at about 2100 feet above sea level, and this lot has views of the West Maui Mountains, North Shore of Maui and majestic Haleakala.
• 850 Kai Huki Circle is direct oceanfront at an elevation of about 150 feet, so these views are straight out to the ocean all the way to the horizon.
• 63 Kuahulu Place is also direct oceanfront, but this time almost at sea level. Google Earth has the elevation at 3 feet.  This lot has the multi-island view that so many folks on West Maui treasure.
• 0 Makena Road is across the street from the ocean with an elevation range from 15 feet to 50 feet. The view overlooking Big Beach is of Kahoolawe and Molokini Crater.

All the views are special; it is just a matter of personal choice.

Weather

Moving onto weather, you can tell from the map that there will be differences. I recommended that buyers consult two tools from the University of Hawaii.

• Rainfall Tool
• Temperature Tool

Let’s have some fun on our map regarding rainfall:

Just as with everything else, the diversity of mean annual rainfall is significant, ranging from 11.20 inches to 56.32 inches. You can choose between a little rain, a moderate amount of rain and a fair amount of rain. I live near one of the “fair amount of rain” listings, and my wife and I love it.

Lifestyle

Finally, there is the lifestyle differences of these listings.  You can see that 21 Lahaole and 45 Ahinahina are more of off the beaten path living. 850 Kai Huki Circle is also off the beaten path; it is also the closest to world-class windsurfing, kite boarding, and the world-famous Jaws surf spot. 63 Kuahulu and 0 Makena are both on leeward sides of the islands and are closer to the resort areas, Lahaina and Wailea respectively.

To argue that one of these lots is better than another is really a fruitless exercise. Each of these lots offers something wonderful to that right person. The reader gets to decide which lot is the best lot for them, if any. These are only five listings. On September 4^th, 2019 there were 264 vacant land listings on Maui. Therefore, if none of these five meets your needs, there 259 other possibilities.

Feel free to contact me to begin your Maui vacant land search.