Castle & Cooke’s
Oahu home sales
help lift net 3%

Future results are expected
to get an additional boost from
isle residential business

By Russ Lynch
Star-Bulletin

Castle & Cooke Inc. today reported a third-quarter profit of $4.14 million, up nearly 3 percent from $4.02 million in the 1998 quarter. Per-share earnings were flat at 24 cents.

The Los Angeles-based developer of homes on Oahu and residential and commercial properties on the mainland, said the net in the latest quarter was boosted by a $2 million after-tax gain from the sale of some land in Central Oahu.

Last year's third-quarter profit also had a special boost, $8.1 million from the sale of two large undeveloped properties on the mainland.

Castle & Cooke shares, traded on the New York Stock Exchange, fell 25 cents to close at $13.94 today. The stock is down 5.5 percent so far this year.

For the latest quarter, the company reported higher results from its Oahu residential operations.

The number of new homes delivered and the prices of homes sold were both up on Oahu, said David H. Murdock, chairman and chief executive officer. He said future results should be helped by that trend, as sales of new homes are boosted by an ongoing reduction in the island's for-sale inventory of previously owned homes.

The company delivered 115 new homes on Oahu during the latest quarter at an average price of $279,000. In the year-earlier period, there were 103 Oahu deliveries at an average price of $270,000. Castle & Cooke at the end of September had a backlog of 88 Oahu homes sold but not yet delivered to buyers, compared with 81 at the end of September 1998.

On the mainland, the company had third-quarter deliveries of 20 homes, at an average of $182,000, compared with seven in the 1998 quarter, at an average of $129,000.

The company's total revenues for the latest quarter were $80.9 million, up 2.3 percent from $79.1 million in the year-earlier quarter.

Hawaii resort operations _ two hotels on the island of Lanai and their golf course _ increased their third-quarter sales by more than $6 million to $20 million this year, from $13.8 million in the 1998 quarter.

The Lanai resorts reduced their operating losses by 33 percent to $3.5 million in the 1999 quarter from $5.3 million in the year-earlier period.

Total mainland and Hawaii property sales were down $7 million at $45.1 million, while revenues from commercial activities and other nonproperty business were up $3.6 million at $15.8 million.