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OBITUARY
to my neighbor 1990-1999,
Ulrich "Sonny" Kamahele (April
15, 1923 to November 2002)
I
recently learned that my one and only neighbor (for many years 1990-1999), an
old Hawaiian man, died in late 2002... My oldest daughter (of five) accidentally
saw the obituary notice in the local newspaper.
He was born on his parents’ remote coastal property in 1923, and raised
there, where he lived there his whole life.
Even in the year 2000, the road was still a narrow dirt road, covered
with a shady canopy of mango trees. Sonny
was the youngest child, and the only son, of six children... His nickname was
Sonny because he was the youngest child and the only son... I used to tell him
that if i ever had a son, [now that i had 5 daughters, and because he had five
older sisters], that i would name the boy Sonny, after him...
When Sonny’s mother died in 1973, he finally inherited the 13-acre
oceanfront estate, with a 200-year-old, thick rock-wall boundary on 3 sides, and
600 huge old coconut trees, with an old, decrepit, hand-built shack, at the top
of a picturesque grassy hill. Until
i bought my property, just a few hundred yards down the road, in 1990, for his
whole life he had NO other neighbors for miles in every direction.
In
1975, about 105 relatives challenged his ownership of what appeared to be a very
valuable oceanfront estate. That
led to a 5-year court battle with the relatives, and he eventually won title to
the property by reason of "Adverse Possession," which is also known as
“Squatter’s Rights.” No one
in his family had ever recorded their ownership to the property, after it had
been handed down to his ancestors in the Great Mahele of 1843, by the King of
Hawaii... His family had owned the property for generations, but until 1978, no
one had recorded their ownership...
But
apparently, ever since 1967, he had been trying to sell the place...
When i met him in 1989, he was asking $3.9 million.
I was a real estate agent, and i quickly produced a Japanese buyer for $3
million cash -- an offer he rejected... I
also came up with an offer of $1.5 million from a new client, Mr. Hy Hunter.
After exploring the property for about an hour, he asked me to write up a
purchase contract, right there on the spot.
The offer was for only $1.5 million, but included a $100,000 cash
deposit, immediately that same day upon signing the offer (in real $100 bills,
which were counted out in front of Sonny, on the hood of the rented Jeep
Wrangler). Hunter
subsequently made offers of $1.5 million at least once every year during
each of the next 7 years, but Sonny rejected them all....
In 1991, the real estate market began it's downturn, and Sonny lowered
his asking price to $3.6 mil... then $3.5 mil... then $3 mil... then $2.5 mil...
then $2 mil... Finally, about 7
years later, he lowered it to $1.5 mil... so i called Hy Hunter, who had been
making offers of $1.5 million all these years, and he decided to offer only
$750,000... No luck...
Meanwhile,
all these years, this old Hawaiian man, Sonny, had been living there all alone
-- with no running water, no electricity, no television, and no phone... He had
only an old transistor radio for entertainment...
We bought his food for him, since he didn't drive... He spent only about
$20 a week on his food, only 4 items: instant coffee, white sugar, white bread,
and saltine crackers…
But he was very proud and arrogant. He used to say: "God-damit!! This property is all mine!! ALL MINE!!" He said that line so many times, i can still hear him boasting about it now... So i used to ask him: "So what are you going to do when you sell the place? what are you going to do with all the money?"
He
looked at me, and told me: "I'm
going to Las Vegas, and I’m going to gamble, and I’m going to drink, and
I’m going to have prostitutes, all I want..."
So
another year or so went by, and he finally lowered his asking price to
$700,000... and a big sign stood outside his rock wall advertising the real
estate company to contact... This
time, i called Mr. Hunter again, and this time Hunter offered only $400,000...
Again, it was rejected...
So
about 1998, i was talking to another associate, the president of a bank in
southern california, and i mentioned Sonny’s property for sale, and since this
bank president had seen the property himself years earlier, he told me that he
personally would loan me $300,000 to buy the property at 12% interest-only for 3
years... so i wrote up an
offer for $300,000 cash, which Sonny quickly rejected...
The old man said the price was $700,000 and he said he was firm, and that
he would not go down... But
he told me he would take terms... So
i went home, and came back 2 weeks later with an offer for $700,000 with $10,000
down, with no interest, with payments of $1,000 a month for 7 years, and then a
balloon... He rejected it
again... but he suggested that i shorten the time period to only 3 years,
instead of 7 years, and then a balloon...
So i decided to offer $700,000 -- this time with only $1,000 down – but the
same monthly payment of $1,000 a month, and again no interest, with a balloon in
only 3 years... He considered the
offer for 2 weeks, and finally he accepted it!!!!! Then we brought a notary out to see him, to verify that
he really understood the offer and wanted to sell it on those terms... The offer
was written in plain, simple english, in large type, on one page, in about 8
sentences, each sentence numbered. He
could also live on the property until he was totally paid in full...
(Hunter’s offers, that he kept rejecting for $1.5 million, would have
allowed him to stay on the property for the remainder of his life).
Anyhow,
I was the FIRST ONE in the HISTORY of HAWAII to ever buy this property... and the very next day, i sold it, on paper, to Hy
Hunter for a nice small profit. We
opened escrow, and after 30 days, escrow closed, and it was recorded in my name,
with a mortgage to the old Hawaiian man... But unbeknownst to me, he had never
cashed the original $1,000 check for
the deposit, and started bragging about it to others, and showing off my
uncashed $1,000 check. Eventually, his niece found out that he had sold it, and
she soon took me to court, to overturn the sale... In court, the old man testified that he had been trying
to sell it since 1967, and that he still wanted to sell it... But the niece claimed that he was "demented,"
although the notary claimed that he seemed very happy with the offer and that he
definitely wanted to sell it... The notary had asked him so many times if he
REALLY wanted to sell it on these terms, and she asked him so many times that he
got angered with her... "God-damn
it!! i've been trying to sell this
place since 1967!!"
Finally,
rather than try to battle it out in court, with long-drawn out legal fees, etc.,
i decided to sell it back to the family.
The
old man finally died this month, i just found out today, and sadly, he never saw
a penny from the property that he was born and raised on, and lived on and
developed for his whole life, and had been trying to sell ever since 1967...
He spent 5 years battling 105 relatives for ownership of the property,
and finally won title by reason of "adverse possession."
To me alone, he boasted hundreds of times:
"It's all mine, god-damit... it's ALL MINE!!!!!" (nearly
screaming it out loud)... but sadly, he never got the chance to enjoy his life's
dream of the fun times he was gonna have in Las Vegas...
When
i heard he died (Hawaii Tribune Herald obituaries, November 19th), tears ran
down my eyes...
Take
care,
Bob
Silverstein