Hi Katrina,
Sorry it's been hard finding someone to list your condo. As I read your post I had a few thoughts:
-Did you use a realtor when you purchased? Are they willing to list it? I did and he was the first agent that I contacted. He is a good personal friend and also very busy while doing real estate on the side. So, I have been reluctant to nudge him or ask why he isn’t giving this any attention.
-Sounds like a great location. You're right, that is a lot of sq ft for a Waikiki 2 bedroom. What floor is it on? Some of those beach front buildings could have some minor obstructions in the lower floors (trees, parking garage roof, etc.). It is on the second floor with unobstructed views. The view is absolutely breathtaking. It is in the Foster Tower Building above Cheeseburger in Paradise
-A $5k a month maintenance fee is a lot, even for Waikiki! There are very few units that have that high of a maintenance fee, and most of them are in luxury buildings with price tags of $5M or higher. Do you know why your maintenance fee is so high? It is because of the size of my unit. I have the largest unit in the entire building. It's bigger than the penthouse. It is actually two units combined plus I own my neighbors lanai. I'm thinking that I should sell my neighbor his lanai which will reduce my HOA fees. And I'm considering reverting the units back to two units which would split the HOA fees between the two units.
-A lease expiring in 2034 is a little short. This could lead to your sale price being equal to, or less than, what you paid for it.
-How long was the unit on the market before you purchased it? This will give you some idea on marketing the unit now. The unit was on the market for about a year. The starting asking price was close to $1M and they kept dropping the price slowly until the end when they sort of dumped it and I scooped it up in a competition with another buyer.
-If the fee was available last year for $1.4M, I would assume similar sized fee simple units were selling for just under $2M. Your LH unit sold for $200k. Even with 13 years left on the lease, last year, that seems like a low sale price for the size and location. I agree. It wasn’t marketed very well and was not easy to show because the owners were out of country and there were renters.
-Have you rented out the unit? It should be resort zoned. Were you able to do STR? I have not rented it yet. It needed a lot of cleaning up, updating, and still doing some remodeling. It can be rented for minimum 30 days. I plan to rent it STR as soon as I'm finished with the above in order to maintain investment property status.
All this being said, I believe the sizeable maintenance fee is probably the biggest obstacle. The short lease is something to be aware of, but it is a minor issue in light of the size and location (assuming it is a high floor unit).
Hope this is helpful! Yes- Super helpful and thank you. I will focus on reducing those HOA fees.
Isi
