The Fees

They are the deal breaker.
Not just any fees, but the maintenance fees you pay when you live in a condo or townhouse.
Okay, I can see that you gotta hire folks to cut the grass and maintain the place, but seriously, is it necessary to charge like $500 a month?
Which is pretty close to what maintenance fees here average.
I was thinking of moving to Honolulu, what is known as the metro section, but the average cost per square foot is like $400.
For one square piece of whatever kind of flooring the place has.
The cost around the present Flat Tire Central is pretty close to that but over near where my brother lives it's a much more affordable $300.
If you can call that affordable.
Let me get back to the fees.
So I'm looking around and really it's not the cost of the place that's holding me back.
I mean okay it's expensive and all but the mortgage payments are affordable since the rates are down and I can actually afford someplace a little nicer.
Except for them fees.
In most cases, the fees equal or exceed the actual mortgage payments!
Just to give you, the reader, an idea of what I'm talking about, the highest charge for maintenance fees I've see so far was about $600 dollars a month.
Okay, it included stuff like the water and sewer and cable, but still, that's on the far side of ridiculous!
So what it all amounts to is I'm scrambling to figure out my months expenses and seeing just how spartan I gotta live in order to afford one of these places.
Which I'll get to later.
How affordable these places are I mean.
I use the word affordable lightly as they aren't really affordable, not in real world terms.
I mean affordable in relation to the local market.
In the two weeks or so I've been looking, it seems like finding a good place is kinda like finding a job.
All the good ones are taken and all you got are ones that don't really fit you; someone has to die or retire before the spot opens up.
Except in the local housing market, someone has to die because the retired folks are staying put.
Then theres' the matter of the land that places are built on which can be either lease hold or fee simple.
More on this later.
It involves some of the history of the islands and how the land was split up, a time called the Great Mahele.
I gotta say, although this is like shopping, it's not fun like shopping for there are a lot of things to consider, things like the rest of my life.
If you know what I mean.
So anyways, finding a new Command Center is taking a while.
I mean you can't dominate the world from just any ole place.
Image is everything.
Don't you know.