For years, the beachfront house at 59-181 D Ke Nui Road that looks out on the tantalizing deep blue and turquoise hues of the Pacific Ocean on Oahu’s North Shore has been battered by large winter waves. In December 2013, a powerful westerly swell tore the deck off the house and left it poised on the edge of a sheer, sandy cliff.

But that hasn’t stopped prospective buyers from being lured to this stunning spot along one of Hawaii’s most famous coastlines. The home has sold three times over the past decade, with property owners installing stacks of so-called burritos — long, heavy sandbags often attached to black tarps — along the public beach to keep it from falling into the ocean.

Some of the work has been done illegally; other sandbags were installed with the state’s permission under the condition that they be removed after a few years. The emergency approvals, which have bypassed environmental reviews, are meant as a stopgap measure to stave off an immediate public safety hazard.

As the clock was ticking on the latest sandbag authorization in 2020, the property owners put the home up for sale. Eric and Moniza Freeman, from Santa Ana, Calif., purchased it for $2.5 million the day after Christmas, according to state and city property records. They’re now under pressure from the state to soon remove the protections and find a solution for their threatened home, which could entail moving it back on the property line, or even demolishing it. Messages seeking comment from the owners were not returned.

The home is one of dozens along Oahu’s North Shore that were given temporary approvals by Hawaii’s Department of Land and Natural Resources to install burritos in recent years. Most of those protections, which were typically limited to three years, have since expired. But property owners have refused to remove the barriers, which have marred prized beaches and in some cases blocked public beach access. In the majority of cases, DLNR has been reluctant to enforce its own deadlines by exacting penalties that can include fines of up to $15,000 a day. But DLNR officials have been warning homeowners that the time has come for them to find a long-term solution.

“Climate change, sea level rise, wave energy in new patterns, new powerful waves,” said DLNR Chair Suzanne Case as she stood amid debris and broken up burritos in March along Rocky Point where one of the homes along this stretch had collapsed onto the beach. “This is a beach that is so important to the public, and these houses are built on sand berms and there is just really no way they can last.”

An investigation by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser and ProPublica published in December 2020 found that over the past two decades, DLNR had granted 66 emergency shoreline permits to property owners across the islands, with about half issued to properties along Oahu’s North Shore, known as the Seven Mile Miracle for its beauty and prime surf breaks. The news organizations found that while the protections were meant to be temporary, property owners were often granted repeated extensions or state officials lost track of the approvals, allowing walls of sandbags to remain on public beaches for years and sometimes decades.

Those protections have helped extend the lifespans of homes that may otherwise be damaged or destroyed by the ocean. The news organizations also found that property owners, particularly along Oahu’s North Shore, had been cashing in in other ways by selling the homes with the temporary protections to buyers who weren’t always aware of the mess that they were inheriting.

A review of real estate records and advertisements in recent weeks by the Star- Advertiser found that since its investigation was published, homes with expired or expiring burritos have continued to sell at high prices, leaving new owners in an increasingly difficult predicament. Out of the 33 properties along the prime North Shore stretch of coastline that, according to DLNR documents, received emergency approvals, five have been sold since the news organizations’ investigation, according to state and city property records and real estate listings. Two more properties, listed for sale for $5.5 million to $5.8 million, are in escrow, according to real estate listings. Their burritos expired in January 2021, according to DLNR records. The property owners couldn’t be reached for comment.

DLNR said that it believes none of the properties along the North Shore whose burritos have expired have removed them, though it’s not always clear whether a burrito system remains in front of a property, as owners often try to cover them with sand. Others fail, littering the beach or getting whipped around by waves and pulled out to sea.

Down the coast toward Sunset Beach, another house has teetered atop a sand berm for the past several years, shielded by stacks of burritos that have protected it and neighboring properties from powerful waves. An ad for the property at 59-147 Ke Nui Road boasted of the home’s “fantastic location” near Sunset Beach and beautiful ocean views. The ad disclosed that the property has experienced erosion, but says the owner had completed a $50,000 “beach stabilization” project and was in the midst of requesting a “permanent solution” from DLNR, along with neighbors.

DLNR records indicate that the property owner received approval in August 2018 for a burrito system, which was to expire in August 2021. While the ad doesn’t specify what the permanent solution was that homeowners were seeking, property owners have been agitating for seawalls, which DLNR has repeatedly said is not an acceptable solution and structurally unfeasible along this coastline.

The home was sold in December 2021 for $1 million, several months after state documents indicate the burritos expired. The new owner declined to comment publicly on the matter.

At nearby Laniakea Beach, property owners also have been battling the ocean, particularly during the summer months before west swells in the winter replenish the sand and widen the beach.

DLNR records indicate that state officials granted approval for burritos for three neighboring homes along this beach in July 2019, which are set to expire this July.

Kristen Routh-Silberman, a Las Vegas Realtor, bought one of the properties, at 61-635 Kamehameha Highway, for $3 million in April 2021, according to city records. She declined to discuss her plans for the property and whether she would remove the erosion protection.

“I think you should call someone that knows more about the issue,” she said. “We are going to go over in the summer and check it out.”

Another Laniakea home at 61-647 Kamehameha Highway, sold for $2.95 million in March 2021, up from $2.5 million in 2004. An online advertisement for the vacation rental lists the five-bedroom, four-bath house for rent for $1,850 per night. The new owner did not return messages seeking comment. An inspection of the property showed black tarp protruding from a large mound of sand in front of the property. Signs were erected on top of the pile of sand that read: “Stay Off Dune: Shoreline Restoration.”

Coastal geologists have warned that — far from restoring the shoreline — sandbags, burritos and heavy tarps can be just as damaging to Hawaii’s sandy shorelines as seawalls, which have contributed to the loss of about one-quarter of Oahu’s beaches. Scientists warn that figure could rise to 40% by 2050. As waves hit hard barriers they claw away at the sand and prevent beaches from migrating inland, which is key to their survival.

Last year DLNR sent letters to the owners of the Laniakea properties warning that they were out of compliance with permit conditions. A DLNR spokesman said that the property owners had not responded.

David Lundstrom, director of agent services at Hawaii Life Real Estate Brokers, said that in his experience there has been full disclosure about the risks of buying coastal property in Hawaii. But the North Shore still remains highly desirable, particularly for mainland buyers, who during the pandemic were increasingly settling in Hawaii, where they would work remotely.

“We definitely have to disclose all of that, obviously,” he said. “It is always a hot topic in making sure everyone understands what they are getting into and eyes wide open. We still see that they do continue to make that determination to go ahead and buy.”

He said that the state’s permissive attitude toward allowing burrito systems on the North Shore has also assuaged buyers’ concerns. The state “has let them sort of extend the time frames even though they said they need to remediate this and pull these up,” Lundstrom said.

DLNR spokesman Dan Dennison said that the department continues to “bring what we consider the most egregious violators” of shoreline laws in front of the Board of Land and Natural Resources, which makes final determinations about fines. He did not elaborate on why DLNR has not sought fines against the dozens of property owners along the North Shore that have expired permits, but said DLNR is in the midst of other cases relating to shoreline violations, the outcome of which could determine how it proceeds in the future.

Beginning today those selling coastal properties will also have to disclose the risks of sea level rise under a new mandatory disclosure law passed by the Legislature. The risks to individual properties can be assessed via the Hawaii Sea Level Rise Viewer, an online tool that is searchable by individual properties.

Lundstrom said that some of the forecasts related to sea level rise are “certainly alarming,” but he didn’t think it would deter the majority of oceanfront buyers. “They are understanding it and they are thinking, ‘maybe I’ll hold the property for 10 years or less,’” he said.