More about Buying Homes on Oahu and Real Estate on Oahu, in general:
PART ONE: OAHU REAL ESTATE: THE BASICS
PART TWO: THE NUTS AND BOLTS OF BUYING A PROPERTY ON OAHU
5. Oahu Real Estate for Sale is Organized into a Centralized MLS (Multiple Listing Service) - The public has access to ALL the Oahu properties in the MLS just by visting the Oahu MLS Public Website www.hicentral.com. REALTORS that belong to the Honolulu Board of REALTORS have access to a more detailed version of the same database of real estate on Oahu. The Honolulu Board of REALTORS MLS also lists some real estate from islands other than Oahu, but the other islands belong to two other separate MLS databases.
Unlike New York and some other areas of the country, all REALTOR Members of the MLS have access to the same MLS data and it is in one centralized repository. The vast majority of all real estate on Oahu is sold through the Honolulu Board of Realtors Oahu MLS, but there are also a few FSBOs that are not listed among the Oahu real estate in MLS, and a few properties that are sold without listing. As a result, working with numerous agents does not give a Buyer an advantage or access to more Oahu properties, as it may in some other localities. All agents have the same ability to access to information about Oahu Real Estate. In this State, buyers typically give agents the courtesy of working with only one agent at time.
6. Oahu Real Estate is Broken Down Into 11 Primary Regions - These are Metro, Diamond Head and Hawaii Kai (all in Honolulu), Kailua and Kaneohe (which together, we call Windward Oahu, and this area includes several towns up and down the Eastern or Windward Coast of the island), Northshore, Central (Mililani and Wahiawa), Pearl City (Pearl City and Aiea), Leeward (Kapolei, Makakilo, Makaha), Ewa Plain (Ewa Beach) and Waianae.
In each region there are also many different neighborhoods. It helps to know these regions when you are looking for real estate on Oahu. It helps even more to know the neighbohoods on Oahu. Each region and neighborhood has its own different character, weather and other attributes. This is where a great REALTOR comes in. The Oahu MLS allows your REALTOR to search by neighborhood, region, city, tax map key (TMK) or zip code, or public school districts --- whatever works for you.
7. Looking at Property - In some areas of the Mainland, EVERYTHING is on lockbox. In case you are not familiar with this, a lockbox is a box on the door handle of or elsewhere near a home that usually contains a key to the door.
In Hawaii, some homes are on lockbox others are personally shown. Some homes are vacant, some are owner-occupied, but many, espacially condos, are tenant occupied. Tenant occupied homes typically require 48 hrs notice to show, as that is the minimum notice required under Hawaii Landlord-Tenant Law. So that involves a little planning. Unfortunately, agent cannot always show all properties on a moments notice and it is best to give at least a day or two notice.
8. Open Houses: Public Open Houses for Oahu Real Estate are typically on Sundays from 2-5pm and Broker's Open Houses are Wednesday and Thursday mornings (depending upon region). Public can attend broker's open houses, also, though that is not typical. The local Star-Advertiser newspaper has a list of open houses in the Saturday and Sunday paper. You can also find a list of Open Houses for the weekend on the Honolulu Board of Realtors Open House Page at www.hicentral.com.
Stay tuned for More of Buying a Home on Oahu and Oahu Real Estate.
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