If Hawaii is to answer the major questions confronting the state – How do we create a healthy economy while preserving what makes Hawaii special? How do we improve our public schools? How do we sustain effective government? – we…
Pulling into the driveway of the Manoa Heritage Center, a visitor could be forgiven for thinking that Kualii, the stately home of Sam and Mary Cooke, was the centerpiece of the museum. This Tudor mansion, built of locally quarried lava…
Will Hawaii profit from the boom? When the U.S. and Japanese governments announced plans in 2006 to move nearly 8,000 U.S. Marines and 9,000 dependents from Okinawa to Guam, they set in motion what may become one of the largest…
Does Hawaii need one? How should we get it? When it comes to diversifying Hawaii’s economy, Paul Brewbaker has his doubts. As a longtime member of the state Council on Revenues and the former chief economist at the Bank of Hawaii,…
Despite her relatively young age, Christine Camp is remarkably accomplished. She’s the founder and president of Avalon Development, one of the state’s largest real estate firms. At 38, she became the youngest chair of the Hawaii Chamber of Commerce. She’s…
Take our quiz on what men should know about working with women You would think, by now, that men would have a clear grasp of how to deal with the nuances of gender in the workplace. Women, though, remain largely…
Finding a way to preserve culture Hui Ku Maoli Ola, a native plant nursery nestled deep in Haiku Valley on Windward Oahu, is a kind of island unto itself. Except for the steepest, most inaccessible parts of the Koolau Mountains,…
Local company solves a big problem: how to cool computers The Problem For decades, engineers have known that heat seriously hinders a computer’s performance. The harder your CPU or graphics card works, the hotter it gets. In fact, some of…
What makes commercial real estate so complicated? “Downtown” Jamie Brown, a CRE All-Star and president of Hawaii Commercial Real Estate, looks puzzled by the question. “Have you ever seen a commercial real estate contract?” he asks. Fishing out a thick…
Will commercial real estate be the next crisis? “There’s an old adage,” says Steve Sofos. “Pigs get fat; hogs get slaughtered.” Sofos, president of Sofos Realty, Hawaii’s largest independent commercial real estate brokerage, is discussing the possibility of a collapse…
Michael Fairall doesn’t go to great lengths to advertise the “green” side of Mokulua Woodworking, his Kailua-based construction company. Never mind the sometimes surreptitious adherence to LEED standards, like low-flow plumbing (“Basically, we bring that approach to anything that we…
Terraformation started by planting 7,200 trees and plants. The ultimate goal: restoring 3 billion acres across the globe.
After two years of rapid growth, Hawai‘i can expect to see a gradual reduction in interest rates, a slowdown in dropping sales, and a leveling off — or maybe even a decline — in prices.
While most of the state’s leasehold single-family properties have converted to fee simple ownership over the past few decades, the leasehold option remains alive in the condo market.
