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Blake Gray “absolutely” thought about selling her Kīhei condominium last summer when she heard Maui County wanted to ban short-term rentals in apartment districts. 

Then a realtor convinced her not to take the chance.

“Nothing will sell at Maui Vista,” the realtor told her. 

In the year since Mayor Richard Bissen proposed a bill to phase out more than 7,000 short-term rentals to create more housing for local residents after the 2023 wildfires, far more condos are going up for sale, and they’re selling for a lot less — if at all. 

University of Hawai‘i economists predicted a 20% to 40% drop in condo prices if the ban passed. But the decrease is happening even before the Maui County Council has made a decision about the bill, in which Bissen requested that the ban take effect on July 1 for West Maui and on Jan. 1, 2026 for the rest of Maui County.

The council originally planned to discuss the bill at the end of 2024, but delays caused by problems conducting a study have led to the bill now expected to be taken up shortly after the fiscal year 2025 budget is completed in the coming weeks.

Realtors and condo owners say this waiting in limbo, plus the economic uncertainty at the federal level, are driving the major downward spiral in the market.

The median price for Maui condos has dropped nearly 25%, from a whopping $962,500 in April 2024 to $727,000 in April of this year.

And as of April, 910 condos were up for sale, a nearly 70% increase from the 536 condos on the market in April 2024, according to the latest data available from the Realtors Association of Maui. 

It’s bad news for sellers, but good news for buyers, although the still high median prices and interest rates are continuing to put many homes out of reach for many local families. 

At Maui Vista, which is one of the complexes on the Minatoya List of developments that would be affected by the bill, Gray said most of the owners thought about selling their condos after the May 2024 announcement. But values dropped so quickly, real estate agents were cautioning buyers and sellers and the pool of potential buyers dwindled. 

Zillow shows there are 10 units at Maui Vista on the market, ranging from $525,000 for a 588-square-foot, one-bedroom, one-bathroom listing to a $1.25 million, 845-square-foot, two-bedroom, two-bathroom listing. Three are pending, including one that has been on the market for 118 days and went through four price drops. 

Gray, who lives on the island, shifted to renting out her condo long term in July. She said it wasn’t because of the county’s proposal. It was just “a real pain” to run the business of operating a short-term rental. She went from bringing in about $6,000 a month on vacation bookings to renting out her 588-square-foot, one-bedroom condo for $2,900, which is what she says she needs to break even. At Maui Vista, the maintenance fees alone are $1,000.  

“So what’s going to end up happening is no one will be able to pay their property taxes or their maintenance fee and their mortgage if they can no longer rent it out,” said Gray, who formerly served as president of the Maui Vista homeowners’ association. 

Even if others made the change like she did, Gray said many units are like hers — small units with big bills that are not likely suited for one family. 

“If our complex of 280 units becomes long-term rental only, there’s no way that anyone can afford the rent that it’s going to take in order to live in that unit,” Gray said. “So it’s not affordable.”

The median price of a property on the Minatoya list was $971,500 in June 2024, the University of Hawai‘i Economic Organization found. That’s about 15% higher than the appraised value of other median condo prices on Maui.

Lynette Pendergast, president of the Realtors Association of Maui, has watched the numbers and the sentiment in the market shift as owners wait for a decision on the short-term rental ban. 

“Things are up in the air,” Pendergast said. Had the decision been made months ago, “this feeling would not be so prevalent.” 

On April 30, 2024, two days before the mayor’s announcement about the bill, there were 40 active condos on the market, according to Pendergast, who cited association data. On April 30, 2025, there were 755 active units. As of Tuesday, there were 877. 

“What that tells me is that this uncertainty with the Minatoya List is way broader,” said Pendergast, who’s also the broker in charge at Equity One Real Estate in Makawao. “There are all sorts of other uncertainties going on in the world. I mean, it’s not just this. But to have such a huge jump, people are nervous. … And it’s reflective of all the condos.”

All indicators show the shift. New listings are up at 190 in April, a 31% increase from the 145 listed in the same month a year ago. Closed sales are down to 64 in April, a 40.7% drop from the 108 sales in April 2024. Days on the market at the time of sale have increased to 146 days, up 15.9% from 126 days. 

The winter months are typically the busiest for Realtors because tourists are seeking out Maui’s warm weather, and many are staying for extended periods of time.

“With whales come sales,” Pendergast said. 

But this winter was a lot less active. Only 339 condos sold from November 2024 to April 2025, compared to 507 during the same period a year earlier, Pendergast said.

Meanwhile, the single-family home market has changed just a little since the announcement of Bissen’s proposed short-term rental ban.

Media prices have increased 6.2%, going from $1.3 million in April 2024 to $1.38 million this April. While closed sales were down slightly from 72 in April 2024 to 69 in April 2025. New listings were also down marginally, from 100 to 91.

But the struggle to sell condos on the market is not just because of the pending council decision or the high supply. It also comes down to the fact that “a lot of people are not looking” because prices and interest rates are still so high, said Van Waki, principal broker and owner of Shore to Shore Realty. 

His company handles condo sales, which he hasn’t seen a major change in over the past year, as well as the management of about 500 long-term rentals. Waki said what’s affordable for a local renter varies — he has one property where the tenant was paying $950 a month. When Waki told the man he planned to raise it by $50, “I thought he was going to cry.” Waki changed his mind. At another property, he’s only charging $1,300 for a one-bedroom unit that could go for much more. 

“My mortgages are cheap,” Waki said. “So I have some cushion, so I don’t have to gouge it.”

But he said for owners who bought their condos more recently at higher prices and interest rates, “you gotta charge a real high rent to make your goal,” particularly those who have to catch up with the revenue from the “short-term rentals they would have been collecting” if the bill were to pass.   

Having lower condo prices, he admits, is a good thing, saying: “Everything was getting out of hand. It’s getting way too expensive.”

But, he added, ultimately, Maui County needs to make it easier to get permits and build more housing. 

“I still go back to, ‘You need to open up more homes,’” Waki said. “Now, people will always grumble about the traffic. What do you expect? If you don’t like our kids having houses, then that’s you’re thinking. Because we cannot stop progress, right? We cannot stop.”

Maui County Council Housing Committee Chair Tasha Kama said last month she planned to put the short-term rental bill on the agenda once the council finishes hammering out the county budget, which passed first reading last week and needs one more reading before it’s sent to the mayor for his signature.