The still vacant three-bedroom, two-bath house on a 1-acre lot in Puna’s Hawaiian Paradise Park is worth about $500,000. But it could cost a lot of people more than that as they head to court to sort it out.
Wow. A house is cheaper in Hawaii than it is in SoCal?
The housemate of my mother just sold her mother's house in Orange County. 2 bedroom and 1 bath, so smaller, for over $1 million.
Unless you are a native Hawaiian, you can only lease the land for 100 years. Further, the cost of living in HI is way way higher than SoCal because everything has to be imported.
Source: ex-Navy who lived there and used to crash open houses in diamond head for snacks when he was poor.
Unless you are a native Hawaiian, you can only lease the land for 100 years.
That doesn't sound right. IIRC, one of the biggest reasons why Guam and the Marianas don't want to become states is that "land ownership only for natives" rules aren't allowed under statehood (for the same reason segregating against black people isn't allowed anymore, even though the circumstances aren't the same), but that ship has long since sailed for Hawaii.
Had to go back and look it up. The answer is it just depends. Some land is owned by the State of HI, in which non natives can own it where other land is owned by the Natives through the Monarchy of HI and can only be leased:
Did you look up paradise park on maps? It's not close to any big city. Look further out from cities in California and you'll see similar prices, but of course you won't be as close to the ocean, but I guess in Hawaii you're always close to the ocean.
It's in one of the most gorgeous and desirable parts of the nation, a straight shot to the ocean (not all of Big Island is coastal!), and a short drive from beautiful Pāhoa.
There are very few high paying jobs in Hawaii, and everything else costs twice as much. Even $500,000 is more than most locals can afford. Also, this isn't beach property.