Here’s another casualty of the worsening housing industry. Oahu has registered a 50% reduction in the rate of sales of homes and condominiums. This is the lowest level of sales since the Asian economic crisis in the late 1990s. Sales of single family homes went down by 46.5% while the sales of condominiums went down by 50.9%. The slow sale was attributed to the cautious and wait and see attitude of the consumers in the light of the economic crisis.

The Honolulu Board of Realtors reported that the lack of demand has resulted to a 10.1% reduction in the average sales price for a single family home or roughly $539,500. This is the lowest average home price for the area since February 2005 when the average home price reached $525,500. The average price of condominium also went down by 5.9% from $324,000 in January last year to $305,000 for the same period this year.

The lowest average price for condominium was recorded at $296,000 in September 2008. HBR research economist Harvey Shapiro said Honolulu has a very weak market right now but they expect an improvement moving forward.