Aloha all…E Komo Mai…Welcome to my blog about Living (and Buying) in Paradise! “Paradise” is the Big Island of Hawaii and by “Buying” I mean purchasing your dream home or land, My name is Trevella Williams and I am a REALTOR® Salesperson with Hilo Brokers, Ltd. 1+808-969-3900 ex. 27 This blog will be primarily devoted to Real Estate on the Big Island of Hawaii, of course we are going to sneak in plenty of talk story about ono grinds, aloha spirit and great beaches as well!

WE are having such beautiful weather! It feels more like summer than our normally rainy winter, it’s still dark at 6:00 AM though and that makes it really tough to roll the old hinney out of bed... but by 7:00 its bright blue sky and sunshine sparkles on the pacific, by mid afternoon we may get some sprinkles but often as not we are not getting any rain until evening. Just perfect!
We have even had some good strong trade winds to blow out the Vog inversion from last week… If you have never heard of Vog before; it’s a mix of fog and volcanic haze and when the wind is just right it can roll into the Hilo area…it looks like a big city inversion (brown cloud?) but white not brown, you can feel the clamminess on your skin and it smells faintly of sulfur, it doesn’t come in very often and usually doesn’t stay long, but if you have touchy asthma it can be a little unpleasant. Mostly we ignore it, the wind will change soon and blow it back over the mountain.

ONO GRINDS; Sombat’s Fresh Thai Cuisine! 88 Kanoelehua Ave. (Hwy 11) in Hilo Town, 808-969-9336 http://www.sombats.com/ This compact and immaculate restaurant has some of the best curry I have EVER had; the green curry with chicken and basil over brown rice is enough to make me wax poetic. But the yellow curry with potatoes is great to, and the roasted curry has that certain joi de vivre, while the red curry is just a tad piquant and the pineapple curry is as fruity as the name.
All can be ordered with your choice of meats or seafood and from mild to Thai hot (which is nuclear!) to accompany your meal have a iced Thai tea, warning: it’s addictive! The restaurant is run by Sombat herself with the assistance of the whole family so you can be assured of excellent personal service. Its right next to Kens house of Pancakes, more on that next week!

REAL ESTATE STATUS: The price slippage of land seems to be slowing and is starting to go sideways now, the selling prices of homes are still heads above where it was a few years ago. We are actually starting to see more pressure from the neighboring islands as the land and home prices remain very high there. The median home list price in Nanawale as of November 10th has risen and is $219,000.00. In Hawaiian Paradise Park the median home list price has risen and is $368,500.00. In Leilani Estates the median home list price is $319,000.00. And In the Hilo area the median home list price is still $449,000.00 and holding very steady.

FEATURED PROPERTY; Great opportunity to purchase 20 acres of beautiful farm land in East Hawaii’s wonderful Kopua Farm Lots for less than $200,000.00! http://www.realestateshows.com/78082 or check out item number 170047528479 on eBay, yes that’s right eBay, http://www.ebay.com/

FEATURED SITE; Check out this great informative site for everything you ever wanted to know about Leilani Estates on the east side of the Big Island (yes I am tooting our own horn!) http://www.leilanirealestate.com/ check out the great 360 degree photo images of the park and association/community center.

TIP OF THE WEEK; All you professional people...Title and Escrow, Mortgage Brokers, REALTORS, etc... check out this site, it can really benefit your business! Remember...one of the most important things you can do is Network! And it's fun, you just might learn something!


ECLECTIC TRIVIA FOR THE WEEK; What is the “Law of the Splintered Paddle”?

This “law” was enacted by King Kamehameha and it states that “Random attacks on defenseless people shall be punishable by death.” King Kamehameha developed this law because of a experience he had as a young man, seems that the future king got caught with his foot stuck in a lava crease by some unpleasant characters and they nearly beat him to death with a canoe paddle! Auwe! They only stopped beating him with the paddle when it splintered due to the strength of the blows! There is no reference to what the young man may have done to piss some one off that bad…but Kamehameha was a very large and very strong guy and he had quite the temper of his own…I would hate to be the guys that beat on him when he finally got his foot out of that lava crease! This may be the Big Island but I don’t think it was big enough to hide from that guy!

NEW TRIVIA; All of the Islands have “nicknames”, sometimes more than one, what are they and where did they come from?

MAHALO everyone…please don’t be shy about asking questions, sharing recipes (I am still looking for a recipe for Lilikoi mochi with crunchy peanut butter instead of aszuki bean? A wonderful woman bought them to an open house I hosted on Kai’ei’ei road and I haven’t been able to find her since, I am seriously craving them!), great beach locations, or a story of Aloha Spirit…always love hearing about some aloha, no matter where it is coming from! Remember; Big Island Hawaii No Ka Oi!

Aloha all…E Komo Mai…Welcome to my blog about Living (and Buying) in Paradise !“Paradise” is the Big Island of Hawaii and by “Buying” I mean purchasing your dream home or land, My name is Trevella Williams and I am a REALTOR® Salesperson with Hilo Brokers, Ltd. 1+808-969-3900 ex. 27 This blog will be primarily devoted to Real Estate on the Big Island of Hawaii, of course we are going to sneak in plenty of talk story about ono grinds, aloha spirit and great beaches as well!

WOW, we had some rockin and a rollin goin on here on the Big Island! But the Big Island got it together and with people helping each other out every one made it through ok! Yes we have some heart breaking damage but we didn’t loose anybody! And that’s the most important thing of all! I will not go into much as it has been well covered Everywhere else, suffice it to say that the South East side of the island had minimal damage, the Hamakua coast more, the wes tside even more and the North West end the most, thank goodness it happened when and where it did. Nuff said.

HELP! My son and I walked into Macys on Wednesday and they are already decorated for Christmas! The day after Halloween! They went from Orange and Black to Red and Green in the blink of an eye!
We have to assume that some nefarious agent has Stolen Thanksgiving! What do we do? Who do we call? (Ghost Busters aint gonna cut it.) Do we have the police put out a APB? And does Thanksgiving have to be missing 24 hours first? Where would a search party look...not my house, it still looks like Halloween! (Sigh…shame.) Could Thanksgiving be only hiding? Is it embarrassed because no one loves it any more? Or is it just trying to get attention because it feels ignored?
Seriously, Thanksgiving is a wonderful Holiday even aside from any religious connotations (don't go there.) it is a special opportunity to gather with family and friends and reflect on what wonderful lives we have, personally I feel like it is the "Family" holiday, it's the one time everyone gets together from far and wide just to gather as ohana! How often do we break bread as extended families any more and what could be more important than the sharing and caring that takes place around the table? I vote for making it two days not one!

ONO GRINDS; Isles café next to the Suisan fish market in Hilo town! Best fish around! And the home made oriental dressing for the salad is so Ono!

REAL ESTATE: Still plenty of inventory at good prices. Prices are continuing to drop though the decline seems to be slowing somewhat and the actual buying (or at least buying interest) is picking up.The median home list price in Nanawale as of November 4th is $215,000.00. In Hawaiian Paradise Park the median home list price is $360,900.00. And In the Hilo area the median home list price is still $449,000.00.

FEATURED PROPERTY; Great opportunity to purchase 20 acres of beautiful farm land in East Hawaii’s wonderful Kopua Farm Lots for less than $200,000.00! http://www.realestateshows.com/78082

FEATURED SITE; Check out this great informative site for everything you ever wanted to know about Leilani Estates on the east side of the Big Island (yes I am tooting our own horn!) http://www.leilanirealestate.com/

ECLECTIC TRIVIA FOR THE WEEK; What is the curse of Pele? It is a well known “fact” that if you are to take one of the lava rocks from Kilauea volcano you will be cursed by Pele (the volcano goddess) with the most terrible luck! And every year Hawaii’s Volcanoes National Park receives tons of rocks being returned with anguished please for their repatriation to Pele and heart wrenching stories of the horrible luck the “lava rock thief” has experienced ever since the theft.
Well, truth be told, the “curse” was invented by a park ranger due to fear that the many tourist would actually de-rock the area thru their ever present need for “SOUVENIERS”! Create one handy story, mix well with superstition and fear. Viola! Instant Curse! Works good though!

NEW TRIVIA; What is the “Law of the Splintered Paddle”?

Mahalo everyone…please don’t be shy about asking questions, sharing recipes (I am still looking for a recipe for Lilikoi mochi with crunchy peanut butter instead of aszuki bean? A wonderful woman bought them to an open house I hosted on Kai’ei’ei road and I haven’t been able to find her since, I am seriously craving them!), great beach locations, or a story of Aloha Spirit…always love hearing about some aloha, no matter where it is coming from! Remember; Big Island Hawaii No Ka Oi!