Kaanapali Shores is one of the best places on Maui to own a condo.  It was the first place that Barbara and I invested in before we ever moved to Maui.  It was carefree.  The maintenance fees include all the major expense items like electricity, cable TV, basic telephone, water, garbage, grounds maintenance, exterior maintenance, exterior insurance, roofs, the free wireless internet and the list goes on.  You simply make your investment, enjoy your condo when you visit and don’t worry about it.

Resort Quest runs one of the best, if not the best, rental programs on Maui at Kaanapali Shores, but more about that later.

“K” Shores, as some owners call it, is the best resort property north of Black Rock.  It sits on a sandy beach.  It is a great beach for building sand castles, walking or maybe sitting in your cabana to enjoy sunsets.   You can walk as much as a mile and a half to Black Rock, the dividing point between north Kaanapali Beach and the south side.  About a quarter mile down you’ll come to Airport Beach.  It’s kind of a “locals beach” with some of the best snorkeling on the island. 

On the property there are 2 pools in the center of the Kaanapali Shores courtyard.  The oceanfront pool was built in 2003.  It is a large pool with a wide sunning deck, hot tub and access to the restaurant and pool side bar.  There is a smaller, more intimate pool and hot tub set deeper in the horseshoe shape that defines Kaanapali Shores.  The two pool areas are divided by a large grassy sunning area.  There are plans to possibly turn that area into another major pool someday. 

Kaanapali Shores is one of the few complexes with a restaurant on site.  It is a perfect spot for a relaxing breakfast, a laid back lunch or sunset dining.  The food is great, the prices are very reasonable and, if you’re an owner, you get a discount. That makes it even tastier.

On the ground floor of the main building there are several shops including gift shops, a salon, a game room, a travel agency, a flower shop, an activities center that offers free breakfast and some cushy seating areas where you can just relax and enjoy the waterfalls and garden setting.

For added security there is gated parking.  This offers a double benefit for you.  First, the parking lot is owned by your association, so the money from the parking fees goes back to your AOAO to help keep your maintenance fees down.  Second, as an owner, your parking while you’re on property is free. 

The beachfront location is great, but the location is great for another reason as well.  Across the street you’ll find several convenient restaurants, a supermarket, a coffee house (no it’s not Starbucks), a dive shop, some gift shops, and you get the picture.  Be sure and ask me about the deli.  It’s down about a block and this ain’t your mainland deli.

Kaanapali Shores was built in 1980.  It is a concrete building, which is important if you happen to be oceanfront, because the concrete should have lower maintenance than wood, for example.  There are 463 studio, one and two bedroom units. 

All of the units have full kitchens, one or more lanai’s.  The units are large by Maui standards. They come fully furnished, and the one and two bedroom units have a washer and dryer in the unit. 

The property is great, but the numbers are really the icing on the cake. 

If you compare the prices at K Shores to other complexes you’ll see that there are some great buys in there right now.  There are some very good reasons why there are bargains, but it won’t be that way for ever. 

Kaanapali Shores is one of the best managed properties on Maui.  Resort Quest (RQ) does an outstanding job.  As a former owner I have a lot of insight into how RQ and the AOAO work.  Every year since we bought in 2003 they have raised the average daily rental rate in an effort to drive the occupancy down to 85% while maintaining the same level of cash flow.  RQ considers 85% the optimal rate for maintenance and service.  However, despite the increases, occupancies have hovered around 90%. And in May of this year, typically our slowest time of year, K Shores was still at 90%+ occupancy levels.

Of course, that translates into lower costs for you.  Because of the combination of high average daily rate and high occupancy, you get the best return on investment that I’m aware of on the island. 

I also like K Shores for long term appreciation potential.  I don’t have a crystal ball as they say, so no guarantees.  But K Shores and a couple of other complexes have sat out at the end of the beach almost alone for years.  Two major projects set to finish in the next 2 to 3 years are linking Kaanapali Shores and the north end of Kaanapali Beach with the rest of Kaanapali. 

One of the major projects is a walkway that will run from Kaanapali Shores to Black Rock.  This will link K Shores to the new properties like Honua Kai, the new luxury building just down the beach.  By the way, the one bedrooms at Honua Kai start in the low $700,000’s, and the 2 bedrooms go to well over $2 million.  Those kinds of prices help to show off what a bargain Kaanapali Shores is and, through the law of progression, tends help drive up prices in the nearby complex.

Kaanapali Shores is a great complex, and with the completion of Honua Kai, the Westin and the walkway from K. Shores to the Sheraton in Kaanapali, along with all of the upgrading that is in progress at K. Shores, I think there is plenty of room for these units to increase in value.