The new owners of 252 acres of South Kohala land hope to have the utilities in place for the first 195 home sites in 2015.
The new owners of 252 acres of South Kohala land hope to have the utilities in place for the first 195 home sites in 2015.
A subsidiary of a Japanese company recently unloaded the property for $70 million less than it paid for it in 1990. Elleair Hawaii Inc., owned by Japan’s Daio Paper Corp., sold the property on the north side of Waikoloa Beach Resort, just makai of Queen Kaahumanu Highway, for $5 million. According to Hawaii property tax records, Elleair purchased the property for $75 million.
Buyer Peter Savio said he sold the land to Hawaii Island developer Brian Anderson and a group he is working with. The purchase of the property closed May 9.
Savio, who operates real estate offices on Oahu, Maui and the Big Island, said the Waikoloa property was part of a larger group of properties he bought. That group also included the Maui Beach Hotel, a vacant lot at the Maui Palms, which he does plan to develop, and a golf course on Maui.
“Our intention was to develop (the Waikoloa land),” Savio said Wednesday.
His lenders, though, were less enthusiastic about him buying those properties and taking on the debt to develop the Waikoloa plot. So, through word of mouth, he found a buyer — Anderson. Savio said he thought Anderson paid a little closer to $6 million for the property, although he wasn’t certain.
The sales price is just more than half of what the county determined to be the property’s market value of $9.5 million. The county collected about $100,000 in property taxes last year for the undeveloped land.
Anderson, who is not part of JPL Hawaii LLC, said the group’s goal is to finish the interior road and underground utility improvements next year.
“The homes are geared toward local families, subdivision consists of single family detached home sites, ideal for raising families and in close proximity to thousands of jobs,” Anderson said in an email late Wednesday. “We feel the location is very unique as it offers resort living with the beach and multiple restaurants within the resort.
In all, the group intends to develop a 420-home subdivision with a park, community center, work out facility and “resort pool experience,” Anderson said.
According to state records available online, JPL Hawaii LLC formed in April. Records list Jeremy Leonard as the group’s member.
The property has an approved subdivision application and a final plan approval, as well as a special management area permit that will allow for up to 420 residential units. Davis said the planned unit development only calls for 195 units — 92 single-family homes and 103 units in multiunit buildings. That approved plan also allows for an 18-hole golf course.
Waikoloa Beach Resort’s 2014 annual report to the state Land Use Commission referenced the golf course.
“Completion of construction on the Waikoloa Homesites Venture’s golf course, which commenced on Jan. 26, 1995, remains deferred pending a change in market conditions, which will not support a project of this nature at this time,” the report said, adding that Elleair Hawaii was Waikoloa Homesites Venture’s successor, via a merger. The 2011 annual report said the Hawaii County Planning Commission gave the project an extension, through April 2013, to build the golf course.
Email Erin Miller at emiller@westhawaiitoday.com.