Post #254920 by tikiyaki on Sun, Sep 17, 2006 7:58 AM

On 2006-09-17 06:44, Rattiki wrote:

On 2006-09-16 22:56, phealphrea wrote:
fighting off bugs are my main concerns at this point.

Well in the tropics cockroaches are 3 inches long and FLY! :o So bring a fly swatter......a BIG fly swatter! :lol:

You know guys if HI is like most resort areas in the world/country there will be plenty of jobs, they are just generally low paying jobs. There has ALWAYS been work here in Key West, but affording a home or condo now is out of the question! If you want to have a real future and raise a family, forget it. In HI it may still be do-able and they are a much more worker friendly state (20 hours a week and you get health benys? WOW! :o) Meanwhile my folks wind insurance tripled in the last 3 years and I have had to stay on to help them pay the $33,000 a year PITI they have on a lousy $250K mortgage! (I converted the old chicken coop into a Tiki Pad so it's not too bad but). They want to sell ASAP for the $1.7 MILLION that it's supposed to be worth (my Grandmother paid $69K for it in '78 :roll:) and go globe-trotting, but they have always said they want to take a bit of that and buy something stateside to have like mainland FL or in the heartland where my Sister could keep a horse. Now because of this thread, I've had them start looking at the big island as it seems like a comparatively good deal! :wink:

Tho' Hawaii has it's bugs, I don't think anything compares to Florida in that dept. No offense, but I don't think there's a place I would want to live LESS than Florida :) Hawaii has those dreaded centipede's tho' which pack a NASTY bite from what I hear, and cockroahes too, but not those B-52 ones (Palmetto bugs) you guys get there.

You should check out punaweb.org, sign up for the message board and start asking questions. The people on there are SUPER friendly and love doling out info on their (mostly) newfound paradise. There's even a few realtors on the board who are supposedly very good, and are experts on the area of Puna. Your parents have to get used to the idea that their place COULD be destroyed by a lava flow, but it's certainly not as risky as those damn hurricanes in key west, and the danger is not mortal, because the lava moves so slow, it's just your property you have to worry about, not necessarily your life.