Historic Marks Estate in Nuuanu is Ready for a New Owner

A little over a month ago I had the pleasure of listing Kahaaina, the historic residence of Clarence H. Cooke of the Castle & Cooke fortune. It’s also more commonly known as the “Marks Estate”. Since then, we’ve had a number of offers, been in escrow, fallen out of escrow, and recently had a price reduction.

The Marks Estate (MLS# 201501158) sits on 4.7 acres and is currently available for $5,361,000

Every time I show the property, it’s like a step back in time. There aren’t too many residences in Honolulu that boast over an acre of property, let alone 4.7 acres, which is what makes this property so special. So many of the larger tracts of land over the years have either been subdivided or CPR’d to make way for new residential lots or subdivisions with higher density. Very few grand estates are left intact outside of the Doris Duke Estate at Diamond Head or the Kaiser Estate in Hawaii Kai.

This is one of the few historic large parcels that isn’t on the ocean. Situated in Nuuanu, this is where a lot of the “old money” of Honolulu was as it’s conveniently directly inland form Downtown. The closest thing available to this is another estate further down the road on Dowsett Ave., which is an acre smaller and nearly another $2 million more.

Dowsett Ave. Home (MLS# 201500865) on 3.7 acres for $7,250,000

Main Residence Features

The main residence of Kahaaina features a commercial grade kitchen, an elevator, a dumb waiter, a grand living room, formal dining room, library, outdoor decks, covered lanais, and 5 bedrooms, 5 full bathrooms, and two half bathrooms.

Commercial kitchen equipped with dumb waiter and formal dining room

Grand living room and entry

Some examples of indoor/outdoor space of the main residence

Guest Quarters and Gate House

In addition to the main residence, there’s an adjacent guest quarters with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. There’s also another 2 bed, 1 bath at the gate house.

Guest quarters has a 2 bed, 1 bath on one side and a 1 bed, 1 bath on the other side

Gate house kitchen

Pool House

Out back of the main house, you cross a stream to get to the pool house, which has 2 full bathrooms.

Pool house seen from the main residence

View of the main house from the pool house

More Information

As I started this article off, we’ve been through a lot since we’ve been on market. With the recent price reduction, we’ve got even more interest in this historic estate. I’ve got several showings lined up this coming week. Although there’s deferred maintenance, opportunities such as this don’t come around that often. To learn more about this special offering, feel free to contact me for more information.