The Galbraith Estate has selected a new broker for 2,100 acres of land in Central Oahu that it is trying to sell.

Bank of Hawaii Corp., the trustee for the estate, today named PM Realty Group as the exclusive broker for the Galbraith lands, replacing Cushman & Wakefield and Sofos Realty Corp.

The property officially goes back on the market on July 28.

PM Realty’s hiring comes weeks after an effort to sell the land to Canadian developer Dennis Blain fell through. Blain’s $40 million offer was terminated by the bank after Blain asked for a 60-day extension.

Despite a soft real estate market, the new sales effort could get a boost from a measure passed by the Legislature this year.

The law, which took effect today, allows owners of ag lands to petition the state Land Use Commission to convert 15 percent of their acreage for urban or rural use so long as they preserve 85 percent of their land for high-quality agricultural uses.

That means that a buyer of the Galbraith lands could seek to convert 315 acres for housing. A developer could build more than 1,000 homes on that much land.

But any buyer would have to compete with public and private sector efforts to preserve the land for agricultural use. A separate measure, which was passed by the state Legislature this year, dedicates $13 million toward that plan.

Based in Houston, PM Realty Group is a privately held, national real estate company with more than 1,300 employees and 20 offices nationwide. In Hawaii, the company manages about 2 million square feet of property and its clients include Chevron, Morgan Stanley, Pacific Guardian Life and the Employees’ Retirement System of the State of Hawaii.

Tags: agriculture, Galbraith Estate, real estate

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