Ko Olina time-share project begins construction May 4
By Andrew Gomes
Advertiser Staff Writer
Plans for the largest time-share project in Hawai'i are coming together at Ko Olina, where Marriott Vacation Club International expects to begin construction May 4, followed by sales in September or October.
The $300 million project, Marriott's Ko Olina Beach Club, will be developed as four towers 10 to 14 stories high. Parking for about 1,000 cars will be in structures behind the towers, surrounded by landscaping.
The overall project will be built in seven phases, each spanning 12 to 18 months, depending on the sales pace.
The first phase — containing 125 units, retail shops, a health club, restaurant, bar and interactive water feature — is scheduled for completion in January 2003, according to project director Michael Kosmin.
Prices for the roughly 1,200-square-foot, two-bedroom, two-bath dividable units cannot be disclosed yet, under provisions of state law. At Marriot's Maui Beach Club, prices range from $18,100 to $59,500 for one-week ownership shares.
The Beach Club is one of two new components being added to the reborn West O'ahu resort, originally conceived in the late 1980s and left mostly undeveloped since stalling in the early 1990s.
In 1998, Ko Olina Co., a partnership of local investors and Ohio-based National Housing Corp., began acquiring 642 undeveloped acres of the resort in an attempt to revive what was envisioned as a world-class visitor destination.
Since then, the firm, alone or with other partners, has purchased the Ihilani Resort & Spa hotel (now managed by Marriott) and the golf course, and developed a 270-slip commercial marina.
Last year, Ko Olina Co. sold large tracts of land to Marriott and a homebuilder for separate time-share and residential development projects.
A unit of Canada-based Brookfield Properties Corp. has an agreement to develop as many as 700 single-family and townhouse residences over the next several years. Recently, Brookfield Ko Olina Inc. broke ground on a first phase of 18 townhouse units as part of Coconut Plantations, a planned community of 270 townhomes.
"It's going to be great for Ko Olina as a whole," said Stan Brown, Marriott's vice president for the Pacific islands. "We have the J.W. Marriott Resort, we also have the golf club, the marina, and the residential housing construction that is under way as well.
"That whole destination, which was an unbranded hotel and golf course just a short while ago, has developed dramatically. It becomes truly a destination in and of itself."
Andrew Gomes can be reached by phone at 525-8065, or by e-mail at agomes@honoluluadvertiser.com.
