If you ask around Kula about renting out a guest cottage or the main house while you're off island, you'll likely hear that there's still room. As of the county's most recent public accounting in late 2025, Maui County's list of approved Short-Term Rental Homes showed nine permits issued in the Makawao-Pukalani-Kula Community Plan Region, against a regional cap of 15. Six slots left. That sounds like math a buyer can plan around.
It isn't the whole equation. In September 2024, the Hawai'i Supreme Court ruled unanimously in Rosehill v. State of Hawai'i, Land Use Commission that a farm dwelling in the state agricultural district cannot be used as a short-term vacation rental, because that use doesn't fit what the agricultural district is for under state law. Most of Kula sits inside that same agricultural district. So the honest starting point for anyone eyeing a Kula property for rental income isn't the permit countdown. It's whether the parcel's zoning supports the use at all, before a permit ever enters the conversation.
What the county's permit list actually tracks
The Short-Term Rental Home program is a capacity system. Maui County set a limit of 15 STRH permits for the Makawao-Pukalani-Kula region, and the county's own approved rental homes list names the properties currently operating under it, including Island Sunset Villa on Holopuni Road, Kula Villa on Calasa Road, and Kula Jewel on Kulalani Drive. That same document lays out the operating rules: a five-year ownership history before you can apply, an on-island manager who can reach the property within an hour if something goes wrong, parking that stays entirely on site, and up to six bedrooms spread across no more than two dwellings per permit.
The pace matters as much as the count. A Maui Planning Commission staff report on a 2024 application at 1695 Olinda Road put the region's approved STRH total at 8 permits that April, alongside 23 approved Bed and Breakfast permits against a separate cap of 40 for the same region. A year and a half later, the STRH count had moved by exactly one, to 9. Code requires the County Council to review the region's rental home restrictions once approvals pass 90% of the cap, which would mean 14 permits here. At the current pace, that review is a long way off. The slow movement is itself a signal: something other than open slots is limiting how many Kula properties actually reach the county's list.
The ruling most permit conversations skip
That something is zoning. Hawai'i's agricultural district is governed by state law, specifically HRS Chapter 205, which defines what counts as a legitimate use of ag-zoned land, including the "farm dwelling" that most Kula homes are built as. The Rosehill case reached the state's highest court after a group of Big Island landowners challenged Hawai'i County's refusal to let them rent farm dwellings by the night. The justices sided with the Land Use Commission and the county, holding that short-term rental use doesn't belong in the agricultural district because it works against the reason that district exists. You can read the court's opinion through Justia, and Hawai'i's Attorney General issued a statement welcoming the decision as a win for keeping agricultural land in agricultural use.
Here's the part that hasn't caught up yet, at least not publicly. The case that produced this ruling was about a Hawai'i County ordinance, not a Maui County one. No Maui court has applied Rosehill's reasoning to Maui's own agricultural district or to its STRH permit program specifically. And Maui County's permit program continues to accept applications from agriculturally zoned single-family homes as a matter of course, the same category of property the Supreme Court just said doesn't fit the statute.
A property can hold a valid county permit today and still sit on the wrong side of a question the state's highest court has already answered for a different island's version of the same law.
That gap between an operating permit and a settled legal question is the actual state of things in Kula right now. It isn't resolved in either direction. It's open.
Why this lands harder in Kula than most of Maui
Kula isn't a place where agricultural zoning is one option among several. Building here typically starts with a Farm Plan, the document Maui County requires before it will issue a building permit on agricultural land, describing what percentage of the parcel will actually go toward crops, livestock, or conservation. You can review the county's agriculture benefits and farm plan requirements directly. Kula's cooler upcountry elevation, its water meter constraints, and its two-acre minimum lot size in the agricultural district all point the same direction: this is farm country by design, and most homes here were built to satisfy that design, not around it.
That's precisely why the Rosehill question matters more here than in, say, a Kihei subdivision zoned residential from the start. A Kula buyer isn't asking whether zoning happens to touch their lot. They're asking whether the fundamental basis for their home's existence, the Farm Plan itself, is compatible with the income strategy they're counting on.
| Permit cap (Maui County Code) | Zoning threshold (HRS Chapter 205, per Rosehill) | |
|---|---|---|
| What it limits | Total number of active STRH permits per Community Plan Region | Whether a farm dwelling can host nightly rentals at all |
| Current status in Kula | 9 of 15 issued as of late 2025, review triggers at 90% | Unresolved for Maui specifically; settled against the use on the Big Island |
| Who decides | Maui County Planning Department, County Council on review | State courts interpreting state law |
| What changes it | New applications, Council action after the 90% trigger | Future litigation applying Rosehill to a Maui ag-zoned property |
Before you pencil in rental income on an ag-zoned Kula property
- Confirm the parcel's zoning designation directly with Maui County's Zoning Administration and Enforcement Division. A listing description isn't the same as a TMK record.
- Ask whether the property has an approved Farm Plan on file, since that document is the county's official account of what the land is supposed to do.
- Search the county's Approved Short-Term Rental Homes list for the specific TMK, not just the general Kula area. Being upcountry doesn't tell you whether that exact parcel already holds a permit or realistically could.
- Talk to a real estate attorney about whether Rosehill has been raised against any Maui County ag-zoned STRH application. That conversation is still open on this island, and the answer could change.
- Value the home first as a residence and only second as an income property, given the distance between what the county's permit list allows today and what the state's highest court has said about farm dwellings in general.
What legal operation looks like today
None of this means Kula rentals are a legal fiction. Island Sunset Villa, Kula Villa, and Kula Jewel are real, currently listed properties operating under county permits, following the same rules every STRH holder in the region follows: an owner who has held the property at least five years, a manager who can be on site within an hour, parking that never spills onto the street, and a permit number required on every piece of advertising. That is what compliance looks like right now, and it's worth knowing in detail if a Kula purchase is on your list.
What it doesn't tell you is whether that framework will still apply to a newly purchased ag-zoned parcel five years from now, if Rosehill's logic eventually reaches a Maui court. The cap gives you a number. The zoning question gives you a timeline you can't see the end of yet.
A few questions that come up often
Does the Rosehill ruling mean my ag-zoned Kula property can never be a legal short-term rental? Not automatically. The ruling came out of a Hawai'i County dispute, and no Maui court has applied it to Maui's agricultural district or STRH program yet. Maui County still lists agriculturally zoned homes among its approved rentals. But the underlying state law is the same one that governs Kula, so the question hasn't disappeared, it's just untested here. Ask an attorney before you count on the income.
If the cap is only 60% full, don't I have decent odds of getting a permit? The 9-of-15 figure counts permits already issued, not how many properties would qualify to apply. Ownership history, Farm Plan status, and Community Plan rules narrow the pool well before the cap does, and the pace has been slow, moving from 8 regional permits in April 2024 to 9 the following year.
What happens once approvals hit 90% of the cap? Maui County Code requires the Council to review the region's rental home restrictions once approvals cross that line, which for Kula would mean 14 of the 15 slots filled. That review could raise the cap, hold it steady, or add new conditions. Nothing about it is automatic.
If you're weighing a Kula property with rental income in mind, the permit list is only half the picture. The other half is a legal question that's still being worked out one island at a time. Kela Fernandez has been tracking both halves closely and can walk you through what a specific Kula parcel's zoning and permit history actually say before you make an offer based on assumptions. Schedule a personal consultation to go through it together.
