In early July, Kauhale Makai was on the list. A committee vote had penciled the 169-unit Kihei complex into Resolution 26-110, the county's first wave of proposed hotel rezonings for condos that have operated as vacation rentals for decades. Then, on July 6, the Housing and Land Use Committee reconvened, amended the resolution, and took Kauhale Makai back off. Kamaole Sands, Kihei's largest condo complex at 440 units, went the other direction. It got added to the same resolution and is now on track for hotel zoning that would let it keep renting short term indefinitely.
Neither building changed. No unit was renovated, no lanai rebuilt. What changed was a committee vote, and that single vote is worth real money to every owner in both complexes.
If you have been watching Kihei condo listings and wondering why the market feels so unsettled, this is the reason. Not interest rates, not tourism numbers. A slow-moving, building-by-building rezoning process that is still being amended as of this month, and that determines whether a given condo can legally rent overnight after 2031 or has to become a long-term rental or a residence instead.
The Median Everyone Quotes Is Blending Two Products
Maui's countywide condo median has been sliding for over a year. It came in at $651,250 in April 2026, down 8.9% year over year, dropped further to $597,000 in May, down 21.7%, then recovered slightly to $625,000 in June. That is the number that shows up in most market recaps, and it is a real number. It is also an average of two products that no longer behave the same way.
Look at Kihei on its own and the picture gets more interesting. In the first quarter of 2026, 59 condos sold there at a median of $610,000. By the second quarter, Kihei condo closings had climbed to 79, up close to 13% from 70 a year earlier, even as the countywide median kept giving ground. Buyers were not stepping back. They were stepping in, at lower prices, in higher volume.
That combination, falling price alongside rising sales, is not a market in retreat. It is a market where price discovery is happening in real time because the underlying rules just changed. Some of that discovery is happening building by building, and it is happening faster in Kihei than almost anywhere else on the island, because Kihei carries the highest concentration of Bill 9 affected condos of any Maui neighborhood.
Two Kinds of Kihei Condo, One MLS Page
The rule that is reshaping all of this is Ordinance 5909, better known as Bill 9. Mayor Richard Bissen signed it into law on December 15, 2025, and it phases out short-term rental use in apartment-zoned condos across the county, commonly called the Minatoya List after the decades-old county opinion that let these buildings operate as vacation rentals despite sitting in residential zoning. For South Maui, which includes Kihei, the last legal night for a short-term guest is December 31, 2030.
Roughly 7,000 units countywide fall on that list, and a meaningful share of them are in Kihei. But Bill 9 only touches apartment-zoned buildings. Condos that already sit in hotel or resort zoning are untouched entirely, no deadline, no phase-out, no rezoning application to file. In the South Maui market, Royal Mauian, Mana Kai, and Maui Banyan are examples of buildings that were never on the Minatoya List and can keep renting short term with no change at all.
That difference shows up in the price data. As of mid-2026, apartment-zoned condo prices across Maui have fallen close to 50% from their 2022 to 2023 peaks, while hotel-zoned buildings have largely held their value. Two units can carry the same square footage, the same view, the same monthly HOA bill, and sit on opposite sides of that gap simply because of which zoning district the building falls in.
| Hotel or resort zoned | Apartment zoned (Minatoya List) | |
|---|---|---|
| Short-term rental rights | Not affected by Bill 9 | Phase out by January 1, 2031 in South Maui |
| Example Kihei-area buildings | Royal Mauian, Mana Kai, Maui Banyan | Kamaole Sands, Kihei Resort, Kamaole One |
| Price trend as of mid-2026 | Held value | Down closer to 50% from 2022 to 2023 highs |
| What to verify | Zoning designation on record | Whether the building has a rezoning path pending |
A separate 2026 law, Bill 88, gives some Minatoya buildings a way out. It created two new hotel zoning categories, H-3 and H-4, that a condo association can apply for if it can show the building was operating as a short-term rental before September 24, 2020. Passed by the county council on a 7-2 vote on June 19, 2026, Bill 88 does not rezone anything automatically. Every building has to apply on its own, go through Planning Commission review, and win council approval one resolution at a time.
The List Is a Moving Target, Not a Fixed Reference
This is the part that catches people off guard, and it is the reason the Kauhale Makai story matters more than a single anecdote. The rezoning list is not a static document you can check once and file away. It is being amended in committee meetings as recently as this month.
Amendments were first noticed for an August 5, 2026 committee meeting, and as of a follow-up hearing on August 19, 2026, the Housing and Land Use Committee still had not voted on the resolutions that would send this first wave of buildings to the Maui Planning Commission. Three separate council member amendments were on the table, each proposing to add more properties. One would add Kamaole One. Another would add Kihei Resort, also known as 777 S. Kihei Road, along with Waiohuli Beach Hale and Shores of Maui. A third would add Kihei Parkshore. A council member also flagged a pending amendment for El Dorado, a Kihei property not previously discussed in any of the earlier resolutions.
None of that is settled. It could not be settled, because these are live committee amendments as of this week, and the committee has said it plans to keep reconvening. A building's status can move from excluded to included, or the reverse, in the span of a single meeting.
Two lawsuits are also working through Second Circuit Court, arguing that eliminating decades of short-term rental use amounts to an uncompensated taking under the Hawaii Constitution. As of the most recent reporting, no court has issued an injunction, so the 2029 and 2031 deadlines remain legally in effect regardless of how the litigation eventually resolves. That could change. It has not changed yet.
What This Means If You're Actually Shopping in Kihei
None of this is a reason to avoid Kihei condos. Many of these units are still excellent buys as residences or long-term rentals, and the correction in apartment-zoned pricing has made parts of this market more accessible than they have been in years. It is a reason to ask better questions before you write an offer.
- Ask for the building's actual zoning designation, not the MLS remarks. "Vacation rentals permitted" in a listing description is not the same as a documented zoning status.
- Ask whether the building is named in the county's TIG Exhibit 2 list, the working document of properties being considered for hotel rezoning, and whether it appears in an adopted resolution or only a proposed amendment.
- If it is apartment-zoned and not on a resolution yet, price the unit as a long-term rental or residence after 2030, not on its current short-term income.
- If it is already hotel or resort zoned, confirm that with the county rather than assuming from the building's reputation or how it is marketed.
- Check the date on whatever zoning information you have. Given how often the resolutions are being amended this year, information that was accurate a month ago may not be accurate today.
The buyers doing well in this market right now are the ones treating the rezoning process as part of their due diligence, not as background noise. The ones getting caught off guard are the ones underwriting a Minatoya unit's value on last year's rental numbers without checking whether this year's committee vote changed the building's future.
A Few Questions Worth Answering Directly
Does Bill 9 affect single-family homes in Kihei? No. Bill 9 applies specifically to apartment-zoned condos on the Minatoya List. Single-family home zoning is a separate matter entirely.
If a building isn't named in any resolution yet, has it lost its chance at hotel rezoning? Not necessarily. The council has said it expects to roll out additional resolutions in future waves, and HOAs can petition the committee to be included. But there is no guarantee of a future wave, and no set schedule for one.
Could the pending lawsuits push the 2031 deadline back? It is possible, but as of now neither case has produced an injunction, so the deadline stands. Anyone weighing a long hold on a Minatoya unit should treat 2031 as the operating assumption and watch the court dockets rather than plan around a delay that has not happened.
Kihei's condo market rewards buyers who ask about zoning before they ask about square footage. If you are trying to figure out which side of this line a specific building falls on, or what a realistic hold period looks like for a unit you have your eye on, Salt & Light Ohana is happy to walk through it with you, no pressure, just a clear read on where things actually stand.
