You can hardly go anywhere without reading or hearing about the national housing crisis, but now, even more than usual, it would be a mistake to assume that the national numbers reflect what's going on in real estate here.
Prices on Maui went way, way up, as they did elsewhere; but unlike many other places, they have not gone way down. Not yet, anyway.
The 2008 third-quarter report from the Realtors Association of Maui shows that prices are up a little here, down a little there. Closings are down by a noticeable amount, but activity is nowhere near a standstill.
Curiously, once a house or condominium goes on the market here, on average it takes even less time to sell than it did last year.
Maybe owners are getting out while the getting is good - although the number of foreclosure legal notices running in The Maui News suggests that many were too late. But if that is what is happening, then many are getting in at what, presumably, they regard as bargain prices.
It still costs $600,000 to buy an average house on Maui, and it would be hard to find anything other than a fixer-upper for less than a quarter of a million.
This must be taken as comforting, comparatively, for those who already own. For those who still aspire to the American dream, the numbers only serve as a wake-up call. Affordable housing for too many of us is still more dream than reality.
Why? Because Maui is no ka oi. People want to live here if they can, and the very wealthy can still park their assets in real estate on the Valley Isle.
But also because government policies, state and local, have made it difficult, time-consuming and more expensive than it needs to be to expand the housing stock for those who aren't among the very wealthy.
While we were lucky to dodge the national bullet, we also managed to shoot ourselves in the foot.
