Help from healthier sectors of economy
By Dan Nakaso, John Duchemin and David Butts
Advertiser Staff Writers
The Kinoshitas have family members in several of the most healthy sectors of the economy.
Dennis Kinoshita Sr. — father of the Stanley's Chicken Market owner — works for Royal Contracting Co., a construction company that saw business boom in 2002. Dennis Sr.'s latest project is helping to supervise the installation of safety nets along the Makapu'u cliffs, to protect against the rockslides that have threatened Kalaniana'ole Highway.
Dennis Kinoshita Sr. left the chicken business for the construction trade.
Deneen Wong, her husband Jarin Wong and their daughter Jaelia. They hope a healthy housing market will help them buy a home.
Like other construction businesses nationwide, 2002 was an excellent year for Royal Contracting. The Federal Reserve Board's repeated interest rate cuts since 2001 have not only directly lowered the cost of short-term loans and leases, but also pushed down long-term mortgage rates, which hinge on investors' expectations of short-term interest trends. In Hawai'i, long-term interest rates dipped below 6 percent for the first time in years.
That led to an increase in borrowing and building, as homebuyers and developers jump into the market to take advantage of historically low borrowing costs. On O'ahu, home prices rose from a 12-month average of $297,000 in October 2001 to $329,000 in October 2002, and residential building and renovation permits have leaped about $5 million per month combined in the last two years, according to the Honolulu Board of Realtors and the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism. On the Neighbor Islands, building activity has boomed even more.
To keep up with the increased demand, construction contractors have added about 1,000 workers to their payrolls, according to state statistics.
If interest rates stay low, construction should stay high, said David Hulihee, president of Royal Contracting.
This is great news for construction workers such as Dennis Sr., 58, who went back to construction full-time in 1998, even though the industry was still in a protracted slump.
"There's a lot of work out there," Hulihee said. "As long as interest rates stay low, people will buy homes, and there'll be lots of other work."
As home prices have risen throughout the building and housing boom, many Hawai'i property owners have also seen their wealth increase, or at least recover from the long-term slide in property values that characterized the 1990s.
The Kinoshitas were helped by this trend, too.
Next: Couple places hopes on housing market
