{"id":233801,"date":"2026-05-07T08:00:24","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T18:00:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=233801"},"modified":"2026-05-07T14:45:29","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T00:45:29","slug":"hawaii-housing-factbook-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2026\/05\/07\/hawaii-housing-factbook-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"Â鶹´«Ã½ Housing Factbook 2026: Affordability improves modestly, but risks mount"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading time: <\/span> 3<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>

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The University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> Economic Research Organization<\/a> (UHERO<\/abbr>) has released the Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> Housing Factbook 2026<\/em>, the fourth edition of its annual report offering detailed analysis of the state\u2019s housing market. The report finds that Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>\u2019s housing crisis remains severe, despite modest improvements in affordability driven by flat home prices, rising incomes and lower mortgage rates in 2025. The Factbook<\/em> also highlights growing risks from insurance costs, homeowners association fees, slow permitting, natural disasters and policy uncertainty.<\/p>\n

“The data reflects our state\u2019s deep housing crisis. Restoring affordability will require the production of more housing, and confronting the barriers that prevent homes from being built,” said lead author and UHERO<\/abbr> Associate Professor Justin Tyndall.<\/p>\n

Key findings from this year\u2019s Factbook<\/em> include:<\/p>\n

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  • Home prices have leveled off, but remain extremely high:<\/strong> The statewide median price of a single-family home was $950,000 in 2025. Median single-family prices rose 1% statewide, while condominium prices declined 2%. Existing-home values, measured by UHERO<\/abbr>\u2019s Repeat Sales Index, were flat.<\/li>\n
  • Affordability improved for a second year, but homeownership remains out of reach for most households:<\/strong> Affording the median single-family home still requires more than 180% of the state median income, putting it within reach for only about one-in-five Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> households. Condominium affordability improved more sharply, although rising HOA<\/abbr> fees and insurance costs may offset some of those gains.<\/li>\n
  • Housing costs now include rising insurance and association-fee burdens:<\/strong> New Census data show that 42% of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> homeowners pay monthly HOA<\/abbr> or AOAO<\/abbr> fees, compared with 25% nationally. Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> also had the second-highest median monthly HOA<\/abbr> fee in the country at $470. In Honolulu, real estate listings from February 2026 showed a median advertised HOA<\/abbr>\/AOAO<\/abbr> fee of $882. Insurance costs are also rising rapidly, with Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>\u2019s aggregate property insurance premiums paid in the state increasing 13% in 2024—well above the national average and the largest annual increase in over a decade.<\/li>\n
  • Permitting delays continue to constrain new housing supply:<\/strong> County permitting reforms have produced mixed results. Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> County and Maui County recorded faster single-family permit processing times in 2025, while Kauaʻi<\/span>\u2019s delays worsened. In Honolulu, UHERO<\/abbr> was unable to obtain records after the launch of the city\u2019s new permitting system, but permits issued in the first half of 2025 continued to show long processing times.<\/li>\n
  • Lahaina rebuilding is moving unevenly:<\/strong> Two and a half years after the 2023 Maui wildfires, Maui County reported 991 permits to rebuild permanent structures, with 634 issued. UHERO<\/abbr>\u2019s analysis finds that single-family homeowners, including vacation-home owners, are receiving permits faster than owners of long-term rentals, apartments and businesses. About 57% of fire-damaged lots showed no permit activity to date.<\/li>\n
  • Policy changes are reshaping Maui\u2019s condo market:<\/strong> Maui County\u2019s Bill 9, which phases out roughly 7,000 short-term vacation rentals in apartment-zoned buildings, has already cooled the condo market. Maui condo prices in 2025 were down 11% from 2023, while prices for condos on the Minatoya list were down 16%.<\/li>\n
  • Extreme weather and flood-insurance changes add new housing-market risks:<\/strong> Severe Kona Low storms in March and April 2026 caused catastrophic flooding, landslides, evacuations and more than $1 billion in estimated damage. In June 2026, updated FEMA<\/abbr> flood maps will add 3,700 net new parcels on Oʻahu<\/span> to Special Flood Hazard Areas, raising costs and financing hurdles for 25% more property owners.<\/li>\n
  • Vacation rentals remain a major share of neighbor-island housing:<\/strong> Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> had about 34,500 active advertised vacation rental properties in 2025, up from 33,600 in 2024. Vacation rentals account for 20% of all housing units on Kauaʻi<\/span> and 15% in Maui County, compared with 2.5% in Honolulu.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    The Factbook<\/em> is based on a wide range of data sources and offers housing indicators at the state, county and zip code levels.<\/p>\n

    The full Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> Housing Factbook 2026<\/em> is available at UHERO<\/abbr>\u2019s website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

    UHERO<\/abbr> is housed in UH<\/abbr> Mānoa<\/span>\u2019s College of Social Sciences<\/a>.<\/p>\n