Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 38, Number 6, 1 June 2021 — Homeownership for Hawaiians Requires Big Thinking! [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Homeownership for Hawaiians Requires Big Thinking!

J LEO 'ELELE V ^ TRUSTEE MESSAGES *

The median price of a home on O'ahu has just reached $950,000. It's currently at $983,500 on Maui and over $1 million on Kaua'i. With such high prices, how ean loeal residents, both Native Hawaiians and others, afford to own a home here? Stories of former Hawai'i residents who have moved elsewhere are eommon. For example, Chelsea W. is Native Hawaiian and was born and

raised on O'ahu. On moving to Washington state, she had this to say: "Being stuck at an 8-to-5 desk job for two years with no room to move up the corporate ladder, high cost-of-living expenses, living paycheck to paycheck, and seeing people I loved being dragged down were the reasons I moved...Here I purchased a three-bedroom, two-bath house with a garage, large yard and street parking for $280,000." Like Chelsea, Ashlynn S. is a part-Ha-waiian born and raised on O'ahu. In 2019, she moved her family to Arizona. Ashlynn said, "We left Hawai'i to get ahead in life financially. We were both working but not being able to enjoy life due to the extreme high cost of rent and utilities. I never imagined leaving the plaee I love and called home, but enough was enough; we got tired of worrying about whether we could afford our apartment. In Hawai'i, we could never think of owning a home, but here in Arizona we actually have a ehanee to be able to buy a home. As hard as it was to leave Hawai'i, we knew we had to do better for our daughter." Some Kānaka are able to get help from government and nonprofit programs that aim to lower barriers to homeownership. At the federal level, for example, the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) insures housing loans, incentivizing private lenders to work with low ineome earners or those with credit problems. At the state level, the Department of Hawaiian Homelands (DHHL) introduced

its rent-with-option-to-own program to its beneficiaries on Hawai'i Island and continues to work on reducing the statewide Hawaiian Homelands waiting list. There are also nonprofits such as the Hawai'i Homeownership Center whieh administers programs to help with down payments and closing costs. At OHA, Quality Housing is a pillar of our new strategic plan and signals the Board of Trustees' commitment to ensuring Hawaiians are well-equipped

with hnaneial knowledge and resources in their quest for homeownership. While these are all helpful efforts, the challenge of enabling Hawaiians to buy homes is greater than what programs targeting Hawaiians alone ean accomplish. A basic problem we Hawaiians share with non-Hawaiians is that there is simply not enough land set aside for housing. According to land use expert and retired law professor David Callies, housing and urban development in Hawai'i exists on only 5% of Hawai'i's landmass, and the rest is mostly reserved for either preservation or agriculture. This situation creates an "artificial scarcity" of land, driving the price of housing upwards. The solution, according to Professor Callies, would be to make a bit more land available for housing. Even increasing housing from the existing 5% to 7% of our landmass could significantly increase the supply of homes. And that could be done without negatively impacting the aina for agriculture or preservation. If we want Hawai'i to be a plaee where all ean thrive, then we have to think big. Programs that specifically help Hawaiians are valuable, but an overall increase in the supply of housing will help Hawaiians and will benefit non-Hawaiians too. ■ Trustee Akina welcomes your feedback at TrusteeAkina@oha.org.

Keli'i Akina, Ph.D. Trustee, At-large