Median price of condo on Maui rises to $537,500

Million-dollar condominiums were popular among homebuyers on Maui last month and helped boost sale volume and the median price for part of the housing market on the Valley Isle.

A report released Friday by the Realtors Association of Maui showed that the median sale price for condos surged 36 percent to $537,500 in January from $395,000 in the same month last year.

The number of condo sales rose 16 percent to 96 from 83 in the same period.

A major driver of the median condo price jump was activity in the resort area of Wailea-Makena, where there were 14 condo sales last month compared with five a year earlier. Even though the median sale price for the area was lower last month than a year earlier — $1.1 million compared with $1.9 million — its effect on the islandwide median condo sale price is positive because the median is a point at which half the sales were for a higher price and half for a lower price.

In Maui’s single-family housing market, the number of sales declined 11 percent to 65 last month from 73 a year earlier. The median price was up 4 percent to $655,000 from $630,000.