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The Honolulu Advertiser

Posted on: Tuesday, May 11, 2004

Schuler buys land for 290 Maui homes

By Andrew Gomes
Advertiser Staff Writer

Schuler Homes has bought a 20-acre piece of undeveloped land at the master-planned residential community Maui Lani, doubling its development plans at the Kahului project.

The Honolulu company, a unit of Texas-based D.R. Horton Co., bought the parcel for an undisclosed price from Maui Lani Partners LLC, a company headed by local developer Bill Mills.

Schuler plans to build about 290 single-family homes on the site. The company anticipates sales to begin early next year, with the first homes delivered around September 2005. Prices are expected to start in the $300,000s and $400,000s for two product types split between the 290 homes.

The planned homes will add to Schuler's work at Maui Lani, a mostly undeveloped 1,000-acre community envisioned to eventually contain about 3,600 homes.

Schuler first acquired property at Maui Lani in 2000, and since has sold 113 single-family homes called The Islands. The company is now selling 140 single-family homes called The Legends, for which prices start in the $300,000 range, and 21 homes at The Bluffs at Maui Lani, for which prices start in the $600,000 range.

"We're excited about this opportunity to complete the vision at Maui Lani and to provide Maui with needed, quality homes that local families can afford," said Mike Jones, Hawai'i division president of Schuler.

Maui Lani was first announced in 1976 by Alexander & Baldwin Inc., but development on the company's kiawe-filled sand dunes between Kahului and Wailuku didn't get started until the late 1990s because of tie-ups over land use, market slumps, repeated sales and foreclosure.

Mills took over as master developer in 1994 and built some initial homes and the golf course in 1996. Other developers have more recently been adding to the home inventory.

Reach Andrew Gomes at agomes@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8065.