Those still exist but you see less of that when prices for a cheap place start at 600,000 dollars. The fact is that people of wealth are moving here by the droves. I know a lot of them are getting out of California. They are buying houses to live here. The one good thing about it is that most of them are Republicans. Hawaii is a heavy Democratic state.
I don't know much about real estate in Hawaii, but I've seen it crash here in NYC. It always happens the same way -- in slow motion. Folks think it happens like a crash on the commodity markets or Wall Street, but the truth is, it can take 6 months to a year before the downward momentum accelerates enough to become noticeable.