Visiting in May, looking to buy a vacation rental

[Rob Tucker]

Certainly no fashion show in the Tennesse, West Virgina mountain region.

Best of luck to you. There is of course plenty of coal to burn in that area.

[anthonyf]

quote:

---

Originally posted by PaulW

The evasion begins. "Next few months" now becomes a year. Typical. Give a date.
I doubt very much it will be $6 a gallon because of basic economics. But we can discuss that endlessly and not convince each other.

Just give a date that I can mark on my calendar, that's something that's clear and testable.
One within "the next few months", please.

---

Economics is a social science, not a pysical science, so giving a date is always a guess. I do not guess, but I do make educated guesses. I do not calculate the price of gasoline on supply and demand of the product alone. But I do price it on its' volitility.

And I also do not act solely in the sphere of economics.

But think what you want, and I will too. But at least I know my thinking included some thought and research and not a knee jerk reaction to someone you do not like on a message board.

[grousehawker]

Wow!
Thank all of you with your very thoughtful responses. Blew my mind.
Lots of stuff we hadn't thought of and will certainly take all your suggestions to heart.

So many different takes, it would be impossible for me to respond to all of you folks individually, so please know I read all of your responses and got a lot out of all of them.
Thank you again!

I'm still not deterred though
We're in the Tourism business here in Alaska (We own a Lodge,) so we're comfortable making other people comfortable. It's also not lost on us the hard work it takes to make something like this work. So we'll see what happens. Bottom line, my wife has never been there and I was only there on layover, on my way to Midway last year, so we're real excited about our visit, regardless if we end up there or not.

Thanks again and Aloha!

[anthonyf]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Rob Tucker

Certainly no fashion show in the Tennesse, West Virgina mountain region.

Best of luck to you. There is of course plenty of coal to burn in that area.

---

I have traveled the region. It is lovely. But for the mountain top removals gloing on in areas I a not intersted in. But I am favoring oregon actually.

[anthonyf]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Rob Tucker

Actually the Big Island is in somewhat favorable position in its way. The population density is low, there is geothermal power under production and the state is heavily promoting expansion, there is a biofuel production effort in initial phases in Ka`u. If and when gas prices hit $6 or more Hawaii will not be the only place affected and Hawaii County has more energy assets than many or most American counties.

Just my opinion of course.

---

Population density is just a number. It does not take into account resource availability. Plus the population went up 25% here in the last 10 years. Did resource availability go up that much too?

The biofuel op is a farce since they depend on fossil fuel for the bio fuel right now and it does not produce liquid fuel. The same goes for geothermal. And I do not see a lot of electric cars on the island.

All this should have been started 20 years ago.

And from http://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/arti...ocal02.txt

quote:

---

Prevedouros said provisions of the Hawaii Clean Energy Initiative are unrealistic. Just getting to 20 percent renewable energy use would require tripling geothermal, wind and biomass production, along with a tenfold increase in solar power and boosting incineration, which occurs on Oahu, by 50 percent, according to his calculations.

"As always, I'm a professor. I'm not trying to sell anybody nothing," he said. "I'm just giving the facts."

---

[PaulW]

Plenty of posts but no testable prediction. Typical Doomer behavior. I've been hearing about Peak Oil for decades, it's always just around the corner. Maybe it always will be. It's certainly no reason to not come to Hawaii, one of the best places on the planet to live.

Come on, $6 gas in Hawaii. When? "In a few months". May 1st 2011? June 1st 2011? Stand behind your convictions.

[KeaauRich]

Can we move the "world is going to end when gas hits $6 a gallon/give me a specific date so I can prove you wrong" discussion to it's own thread? There may be lots of good food for thought in that topic, but we seem to be straying off the vacation rental/retiree topic.

[Bill]

Hello, Grousehawker,

As a Alaskan who migrated here a few years ago, I would be glad to share some insights. I live in Pahoa, but also have a vacation rental in Kona. Please e-mail me direct.

Bill

[missydog1]

You also want to look into your tax rates. I never owned a property here as a non-resident, but I understand it's more expensive.

As a rental, your property is taxed on the commercial rate per square foot, not the residential rate.

Also, you are required to depreciate the rental by the IRS, and then if you decide to sell it later, you have to pay capital gains on the depreciation. You can't exclude it. We were in that situation and it was a tax liability when we sold it. But you probably know all that from your own rental in Alaska.

If I had the money to buy a rental, I would buy one in South Kohala. There is more constant demand. But it was overbuilt a lot in this decade, so you would need to get it at a good price, and figure out if you can afford it at 50% or less occupancy. Actually I wouldn't recommend it unless you can afford to keep it even if you get zero occupancy. There are lots of foreclosures going on over there, of people who had the same game plan as you do.

"Sometimes it's not enough to know what things mean, sometimes you have to know what things don't mean." — Bob Dylan

[Kapohocat]

quote:

---

Originally posted by KathyH...
As a rental, your property is taxed on the commercial rate per square foot, not the residential rate.

---

If you are talking about the COH property tax it is the same rate as any residential property. You just cant take the home owner's exemption.

But if you arent, can you clarify the "tax" rate you are referring too.