1.  Are you a service member stationed in Hawaii and upside down on your home? (it is worth less than what you owe on it) 
2.  Did you buy your home prior to July 1, 2006?
3.  Are you on orders to PCS from Hawaii to a location more than 50 miles away?
4.  Was this home your primary residence in Hawaii?
5.  Was this PCS move ordered prior to Sep 30, 2010?

If you answered YES to these questions, you may be eligible to sell your house in Hawaii under the Homeowners Assistance Program or HAP.

You will need a real estate agent in Hawaii to help you navigate through this complex procedure.  Call or email me for more information.  I look forward to helping you.

1SG (Ret) Kucic of RE/MAX Honolulu reports on Understanding Oahu Property Addresses.

 Have you been looking on line for Hawaii Real Estate For Saleand are wondering what our numbering system is on Oahu in regards to property addresses such as:  91-1234 Ft. Weaver Road or 95-6789 Kamehameha Highway?

The first two numbers refer to the postal code.  Just to name a few, Ewa Beach, Hawaii is 91, Kapolei, Hawaii is 91 and 92, Waipahu and parts of Mililani are 94, Mililani and Mililani Mauka are 95.

If you are familiar with these postal codes, you will immediately know what part of the island the property is located on once you hear or see the address.

There are many houses on the island that do not use the postal codes but the majority of them do use it.

Here is a list of the postal codes.  All of the numbers on this list start with a “1″ which means that it is on Oahu.  The other Hawaiian islands have their own numbers such as 2, 3 , 4 etc…

temponeighborhoods

For all of your Hawaii Real Estate needs, contact Team Kucic of RE/MAX Honolulu.  Your Hawaii VA Loan, Short Sale and Hawaii HAP Specialists.  Serving members of the Armed Forces in Hawaii at Schofield Barracks, Wheeler Army Airfield, Kunia Tunnel, Fort Shafter, Hickam Air Force Base, Pearl Harbor, Marine Corps Base Hawaii, Camp Smith and Tripler Army Medical Center.

The city of Mililani, Hawaii consists of 2 separate locations that are referred to as “Mililani Town” and “Mililani Mauka“.

Mililani Town mostly consists of older homes that were built starting in the early to mid 1960’s.  Mililani Town is located west of the H-2 highway.  In Mililani Town, you can find single family homes of a variety of sizes and some with with generous lot sizes, townhouses and condominiums. 

Mililani Mauka which is east of the H-2 highway has newer homes that were built starting in the early 1990’s.  The word ”Mauka” means “toward the mountain”.  Mililani Mauka is built on the side of the mountain heading up towards the top.  The earliest phases of construction started at the bottom of the mountain and the last phase ended up much higher.

Military personnel that are relocating to Hawaii love Mililani Mauka and Mililani Town because it is very close to Schofield Barracks (Tropic Lightning), Wheeler Army Airfield and Kunia Tunnel (approximately a 10-15 minute drive).  It is also very conveniently located close to Hickam Air Force Base, Pearl Harbor, Tripler Army Medical Center and Camp Smith.  The drive to the latter bases is a little longer at 20-30 minutes.

Home prices in Mililani Town and Mililani Mauka range from the mid 200’s for a condominium to over 1 million dollars for a single family home.  Every single family home in Mililani, Hawaii is eligible for purchase with a Hawaii VA Home Loan and ALMOST every townhouse and condominium in Mililani is eligible for purchase with a Hawaii VA Home Loan.

Mililani, Hawaii is located in Central Oahu.

The Homeowners Assistance Program in Hawaii or, as it is more commonly referred to as the HAP is widely being used by Active Duty Military in Hawaii.

The program is designed to help Service Members in Hawaii with selling their homes and the HAP makes up all or some of the shortage.  Be aware that you may get a Form 1099 and you will have to claim the amount of money brought in by HAP as income.  Consult your tax professional for further details.

This is only available to Active Duty Military in Hawaii that meet certain criteria.  The exact criteria can be found at http://hap.usace.army.mil/EP_PCS.html.

Here is another very important fact about the HAP that many Active Duty Military Veterans in Hawaii are not aware of.   If the Military Member purchased the house using a VA Loan in Hawaii and the HAP doesn’t cover 100% of loss, the VA Loan Guaranty might pick up the rest of the shortage so that the Military Veteran doesn’t have to come out of pocket with any money.  I am working on a HAP right now for an Army Helicopter Pilot who has this exact scenario.

If you own real estate in Hawaii, are an active duty service member and you need more information about HAP or short sales in Hawaii, call or email me anytime for a personal and confidential assessment of your situation.

Interested in a short sale on Oahu?  Be prepared to pay fair market value or very close to fair market value for the property.  The banks are not allowing fire sales so don’t think you can “go in low” and have a chance to get the property unless it is something totally undesirable.  In that case, you might have a chance.

If you REALLY want to buy Real Estate in Hawaii as your primary residence then you will need to make a good offer.  If you don’t, you will continue to be disappointed as you miss out on Oahu Short Sales.  The time that you spend screwing around and making offers that wont be acceptable to the lender will make you a loser in the long run.  Interest rates wont stay low forever especially as the economy shows signs of recovery.  Make a good offer on the short sale and get into the house while can take advantage of the great interest rates.

Need help navigating short sales on Oahu, Ewa Beach, Kapolei, Mililani, Honolulu or anywhere else on the island?  Call your short sale experts at RE/MAX Honolulu, David and Tonya Kucic at (808) 218-9338.

The First Time Homebuyers Tax Credit is now history.  Only those buyers who put a home under contract before April 30, 2010 are eligible for the credit as long as they close by June 30, 2010.

Many people wondered that when the tax credit was gone would the Buyers would be gone too?  I am going to say NO!  I listed another piece of Hawaii real estate for sale the other day and I immediately had 4 showings.  It is too late for any of those 4 potential buyers to get the tax credit for this property on Oahu.

I think the Buyers will still be there as long as the interest rates remain low and the home prices stay where they are currently at.  If either one of those begin to rise, homes in Hawaii may start to be out of reach for Buyers once again.

The first time homebuyers tax credit will be expiring soon unless the program is extended.  You must be in contract no later than April 30, 2010 and close the transaction no later than June 30, 2010 in order to qualify. 

It was recently brought to my attention that Military Personnel on Active Duty who are serving overseas will have the tax credit extended for 1 year.

Getting re-assigned to Schofield Barracks, Hickam Air Force Base, Tripler Army Medical Center, Ft. Shafter, Pearl Harbor or Marine Corps Base Kaneohe?  Are you considering purchasing Hawaii Real Estate?  If you do buy, how soon until you are going to become a SELLER?  Besides trying to get a bargain of a price,  getting the seller to pay some or all of your closing costs for you and having a comfortable mortgage payment with a great interest rate, you must think “outside the box”.

Where is outside the box?  That would be YOU placing yourself in the shoes of the SELLER.  Your real estate agent that works as a “buyers agent” doesn’t cost you anything with most companies when they are representing you.  Team Kucic of RE/MAX Honolulu is one of those companies.  How was your buyers agent going to get paid if it didn’t come from you?

The Buyers Brokerage Company gets paid by the SELLER.  In most cases, the cost to the SELLER is 5-6% of the purchase price IN REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE  FEES ALONE.  Add another approximately 2% on top of that for ESCROW FEES and the SELLERS portion of the CLOSING COSTS.

Where are we now?  You are now a SELLER and you should know that it will take you approximately 7-8% of the purchase price for you to sell your home.  As an example, lets say you purchased a home and took out a mortgage for $520,000.  You keep the home for 3 years and then it is time to move or PCS (for my Hawaii military buyers).  Assuming that you used your VA loan entitlement to purchase the property with a 100% financed, 30 year fixed rate mortgage, your loan balance on that 520k may be around 500k for example.  These are rough examples but should be effective to put it in perspective for you.

•·         You bought home for 520k in 2007 which included your VA Funding Fee

•·         3 years later in 2010 it is time to sell

•·         Your loan balance is now 500k because you paid down some of the principal on the loan

•·         It will cost you approximately 7-8% to sell your home

•·         At 7%, your fees to sell your home will be approximately $35,000.  At 8% it will be $40,000.

•·         Your house must be worth AT LEAST $535,000 to $540,000 in order for you to just BREAK EVEN!

Are you still ready to buy?  Make sure you have professional real estate representation when you seek purchasing a piece of Hawaii Real Estate.  Get good counsel and do a good analysis of what you are getting into when you make the decision to buy.  For more information, visit me on the web, send me a personal email with your questions or call me.

Hawaii VA Home Buyer Information

Are you still “sitting on the fence” and waiting to buy your piece of Hawaii Real Estate?  Are you waiting for the prices to drop further?  As a Real Estate agent in Hawaii working with Military Relocations to Hawaii and specializing in VA Home Loan purchases, I run across Hawaii military very often that fit into this category.

I never push anyone into buying a piece of real estate in Hawaii.  That is your decision to make.  However, if you know that you want to buy a home in Hawaii but are waiting on the market to “bottom out”, please consider this information below.

I put these charts together to illustrate what could happen if you wait on the prices to decrease 10% but at the same time, interest rates increase 1%.

The first chart depicts purchasing a home now at an interest rate of 5% with 100% financing. 

The second chart shows what will happen if you wait on prices to drop 10% from the current price and the interest rate to go up to 6%.

Don’t forget that the longer you wait to buy, you continue to pay rent which is money that is disappearing and will not find its way back into your wallet.

 Purchase Price                                                       Monthly Payment (principal and interest only)

Purchase Price (down 10%/interest rate up 1%)             Monthly Payment (principal and interest only)

Fact #1:  Interest rates for 30 year VA home loans in Hawaii are currently hovering around 5% to 5.5%.

Fact #2:  There is a large inventory of homes for sale right now. 

Fact #3:  Many Sellers are motivated to sell you their house and may be willing to negotiate.

Unknown #1:  House prices.  Are they going higher or lower?

Unknown #2:  Interest rates.  Are they going higher or lower?

David Kucic, RE/MAX Honolulu located in Kapolei, Hawaii

VA Home Sales Expert in Hawaii

www.davidkucic.com

Phone: (808) 218-9338

Email: david@davidkucic.com

Hawaii Property Taxes for Oahu (Honolulu County) 

Hawaii Property taxes are increasing for the island of Oahu, Hawaii.  Our previous rate was $3.29 per $1,000 of assessed value.  The new rate will be $3.42 per $1,000 of assessed value.

When you look on line at Hawaii Property For Sale, you may see something like this or similar to this:

A very simple way to figure out the taxes is to look at the “Assd Val Total”….in this case above, it is $700,300.  Drop the last two zeros and replace the comma with a decimal point so that your new number is 700.3.  Now multiply that by $3.42 which will give you an annual Oahu Property Tax of $2,395.  Divide that by 12 and you get $199.59 which would be your monthly tax payment.  Easy huh?

With the example above, you will notice that the item titled “Home Exemp” is 0.   If you are an owner occupant of your home, you should be entitled to a tax exemption of either $80,000 (up to age 65) or $120,000 (for age 65 and older).  To see eligibility requirements, check out the criteria at the Honolulu Property Tax website.  Don’t forget to file your exemption if you are eligible!  The deadline for applications is September 30^th, 2009.

If you are quailed for the exemption, you can deduct the appropriate amount from the Assd Val Total. 

Let’s say you are under age 65 and are qualified for an 80k exemption.  Subtract 80k from $700,300 and you get $620,300.   Using the simple formula I described above, your multiplier is 620.3.  Multiply by $3.42 and your Oahu annual property tax would be $2,121, a savings of approximately $274 per year.

For more information on purchasing Hawaii real estate, contact David and Tonya Kucic of RE/MAX Honolulu.

Phone: (808) 218-9338

Email: david@davidkucic.com