HONOLULU — Alicia Humiston bought her condo in Lahaina after she visited Maui and fell for its rainforests, lava fields and the whales that gather offshore. She travels there about three times a year and rents out her unit for short periods when she’s not in Hawaii. “Maui was my dream place,” she said in a phone interview from her home in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. But now Maui’s mayor wants to make it impossible for Humiston and thousands of other condo owners to rent their properties to tourists.
So the question is, what is most important?” Bissen said at a news conference last month. “My priority is housing our local residents — especially now.” Humiston, president of the Hawaii Rental By Owner Awareness Association, which opposes the bill, won’t sell her one-bedroom, oceanfront condo that she bought two decades ago if the bill became law. She also doesn’t plan to rent it long-term. “It would take my ability to use my property. And I bought it for my use,” she said. “I love it there.