Fallout from the 2023 Maui wildfires has "underscored the bleak state of housing affordability across the state," according to a new report from the Economic Research Organization at the University of Hawaii, or UHERO.
The second edition of UHERO's annual Hawaii Housing Factbook was published May 20 and was the first since wildfires ravaged parts of the Valley Isle in August 2023, including a blaze that killed more than 100 and destroyed much of Lahaina town.
The fires in Lahaina and Kula "upended" the island's housing market, the report noted, destroying an estimated 3,000 homes, "exacerbating the existing housing shortage and generating a population of displaced families."
"Efforts to address the disaster's consequences have run up against familiar roadblocks including rigid regulatory barriers, slow permitting and infrastructure bottlenecks," the report noted. "High interest rates, high prices and low supply have continued to make housing extremely unaffordable."
"I think certainly the most shocking and important thing that's happened to the housing market over the last year has been the fires on Maui," Assistant Professor and lead author Justin Tyndall said during a virtual press conference Monday. "So this is not a report on the response to the fires on Maui, but trying to put out data on the housing conditions on Maui in general, I think it's helpful context to try to understand why this is such an emergency for people who were displaced.
"They were displaced into a market that was already in a crisis in terms of affordability, a lack of new supply of housing, extremely high prices and a real inability to purchase homes for locals due to unaffordability," he continued, adding that the issue extends to the whole state.
Tyndall said, too, that one of the big changes between 2022 and 2023 was an increase in interest rates, which "changed the market pretty dramatically."
"In 2023, we saw fewer single-family homes transacted in the state than in any year in the last 25 years," he said. "This is really almost all attributable to the [interest] rates."
Although policymakers have been willing to act to address the housing crisis, UHERO said in the report that such efforts take time to show progress while the data "continues to paint a picture of a market experiencing an extreme affordability crisis."
"The consequences of unaffordable housing continue to show up in out-migration, homelessness and more families being priced out of the local market."
The report also shares data – including zoning, rental market, property market and housing stock – at the state, county and zip code levels.
The full report can be found here.
With the new factbook, UHERO also has released an updated housing dashboard, an interactive tool that allows users to explore housing market data across Hawaii's neighborhoods, the announcement noted.
UHERO published the first edition of the factbook in July 2023.
Among its findings, the nearly 90-page report notes that:
- The fires on Maui displaced more than 6,000 households. Finding short-term housing for these families has proven difficult and long-term solutions have "failed to materialize at the scale needed."
- The largest housing program established in the wake of the fires has been a direct leasing program through the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which secures housing by offering landlords payments "significantly above market rents" and then offers the units to displaced residents. FEMA has secured 1,300 housing units, but only 800 households have successfully moved in. Approximately 600 households are still being accommodated in hotels, according to recent estimates.
- Finding market-rate housing on Maui without government assistance is "exceedingly rare." Analysis of Craigslist rental listings show Maui has the highest asking rents in the Islands, while data from Zillow for the first quarter of 2024 shows an increase of more than 20% from a year earlier.
- There were 5,600 single-family home and 7,300 condominium transactions across the Islands last year. Compared to 2022, single-family home sales were down 37% while condo sales fell 36%. The decline in home sales is largely the result of higher interest rates, which peaked at 7.6% in October 2023.
- The median home price has increased by 3.5 times since 2000.
- Only one in five local households could afford a mortgage on a median-priced single-family home. A household would have to earn 183% of the median household income in 2023 to afford — or spend less than 30% of income on mortgage payments — the median single-family home.
- With the highest rents in the country, 56% of households across the state are "rent-burdened," or spend more than 30% of income on rent, while 28% spend more than half their income on rent.
- Permitting waits remain "extremely high" across the Islands and these delays represent an "important barrier" to building more housing.
- Hawaii expanded its housing stock by 25,000 units, or 1.8%, between 2018 and 2022. Nearly all of this growth has occurred on Oahu, which has a net increase of 23,000 units. Hawaii County added 2,600 units.
- Out-of-state buyers — based on the home address listed on deed transfer documents — represented 21% of single-family home transactions and 27% of condo transactions in Hawaii last year.
- On Oahu, 13% of property owners list an out-of-state mailing address for property tax purposes. That number climbs to 23% on Hawaii Island, 29% on Kauai and 32% on Maui. In Lahaina and Koloa, more than half of the property owners are non-residents, and in Princeville and Kihei, just under half of homes are owned by individuals living outside of Hawaii.
Housing stock, by the number
Statewide
Population: 1,450,589
Housing units: 560,873
Median age of housing units: 45 years
Net housing units added over the past five years: 25,330
Single-family homes permitted over the past five years: 10,569
Multi-family developments permitted over the past five years: 691
Active short-term vacation rentals: 32,140, which is 5.7% of housing.
City and County of Honolulu
Population: 1,010,100
Housing units: 369,775
Median age of housing units: 48 years
Net housing units added over the past five years: 23,401
Single-family homes permitted over the past five years: 2,434
Multi-family developments permitted over the past five years: 268
Active short-term vacation rentals: 9,021, which is 2.4% of housing.
Hawaii County
Population: 202,163
Housing units: 88,965
Median age of housing units: 36 years
Net housing units added over the past five years: 2,617
Single-family homes permitted over the past five years: 4,956
Multi-family developments permitted over the past five years: 62
Active short-term vacation rentals: 7,502, which is 8.4% of housing.
Kauai County
Population: 73,511
Housing units: 30,236
Median age of housing units: 41 years
Net housing units added over the past five years: -397
Single-family homes permitted over the past five years: 1,203
Multi-family developments permitted over the past five years: 198
Active short-term vacation rentals: 5,281, which is 17.5% of housing.
Maui County
Population: 164,765
Housing units: 71,801
Median age of housing units: 40 years
Net housing units added over the past five years: -292
Single-family homes permitted over the past five years: 1,976
Multi-family developments permitted over the past five years: 163
Active short-term vacation rentals: 10,084, which is 14% of housing.
