Oahu housing market improves with year-over-year gains

May 7—1/1

Swipe or click to see more

CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARADVERTISER.COM

This duplex property with a combined five bedrooms and four bathrooms on a 3,672-square-foot lot in Liliha sold in April for $1.1 million, which also was the median sale price for all single-family homes sold on Oahu in April.

Select an option below to continue reading this premium story.

Already a Honolulu Star-Advertiser subscriber? to continue reading.

Get unlimited access

From as low as $12.95 /mo.

Oahu's housing market

rebounded in April with year-over-year gains

after mostly slumps in March.

Sale volume and median prices both rose for single-

family houses and condominiums in April compared with the same month in 2023, according to data released Monday by the Honolulu Board of Realtors.

The single-family home

market had bigger gains, with a 26% jump in sales to 262 in April from 208 a year earlier, and a 10% rise in the median sale price to $1,100,000 from $999,995.

For condos the number of sales edged up 2.6% to 431 in April from 420 a year earlier while the median price rose 5.6% to $528,000 from $500,000.

The gains in April followed mostly year-over-year decreases in March. For sales the declines in March ranged from 2.5% for single-­family homes to 22.5% for condos. Median prices in March were mixed, with a 1.5% tick higher for single-

family homes and a 6.7% drop for condos.

The median price is a point at which half the sales were for more and half were for less.

Fran Gendrano, president of the Honolulu Board of Realtors and principal broker at KFG Properties Inc., said in a statement that despite the momentum change, sales remained at softened levels compared with recent years.

The report from the trade association said that based on a 12-month moving average of sales, April's average trailed the pre-

pandemic moving average in 2019 by about 26% for single-family homes and 18% for condos, and was about 40% below the peak moving averages in 2021 and 2022.

High mortgage interest rates, which more than doubled from about 3% in early 2022, have been a big drag on sales.

Yet despite the average 30-year fixed rate rising to 7.2% last week from 6.6% in January, Gendrano said the positive movement in Oahu's housing market from March to April is a good sign.

"The month-over-month rise in sales indicates

buyers are active in the market despite higher mortgage rates," she said.

Chad Takesue, chief operating officer for local real estate brokerage firm Locations, said in a Monday company report that Oahu's housing market is "muted but stable."

Takesue expects steady sales and moderate price increases to continue through summer months that represent the peak home-buying season.

"Pent-up buyer demand is counteracting the dampening effects of higher mortgage rates and economic uncertainty," he said in the report.

Takesue also said that some softness in the condo market has been due to challenges in the cost and availability of property insurance but that this situation is expected to be temporary because constraints in the affordability and availability of single-family homes will drive activity in the condo market.

Generally, levels of inventory of homes for sale and buyer demand continue to favor sellers.

Inventory of homes

for sale at the end of

April would be depleted in 2.8 months for single-family homes and 4.2 months for condos if no new inventory were added and demand stayed at the monthly

average from the past 12 months, according to the Board of Realtors report.