What Hawaii actually requires today

Not nothing, but not licensure of the manager as a manager.

HRS § 514B-132(a)(1) requires a managing agent to be either a licensed real estate broker in compliance with chapter 467, or a corporation authorised under chapter 412 article 8 — a Hawaii trust company. So the credential is a real estate broker’s licence, which tests knowledge of transactions, not of association governance.

§ 514B-132(a)(2) requires registration with the Commission before conducting managing agent activity, biennially, terminating December 31 of an even-numbered year, disclosing the names of associations managed.

§ 514B-132(a)(3) requires a fidelity bond of $500 per unit across all associations managed, not less than $20,000 and not greater than $500,000, and failure to maintain it — including failure to give the Commission timely evidence — “shall result in nonregistration or the automatic termination of the registration.”

§ 514B-132(c) is the sentence that does the most work: “Every managing agent shall be considered a fiduciary with respect to any property managed by that managing agent.”

And § 514B-132(d) is the loophole the licensure bills were aimed at: “The registration requirements of this section shall not apply to active real estate brokers in compliance with and licensed under chapter 467.”

Why the industry position matters here

The task force took this up on May 22, 2026. Real Estate Branch staff said the industry was unlikely to support specialty licensing, and a Hawaii REALTORS representative had raised objections to mandatory condominium continuing education at the March 6 meeting.²

The fallback the task force settled on requires no legislation at all: ask the Real Estate Commission to add condominium content to the mandatory continuing-education core courses. The Commission can do that on its own authority.

That is a considerably smaller reform than licensure, and it is the one most likely to actually happen. A board hoping for a licensed, separately regulated manager profession in Hawaii should calibrate accordingly.

The director-education idea, and what it runs into

SB 3181’s ninety-day training requirement has been proposed repeatedly — five separate 2026 instruments touched board education and none was heard, including a bill that would have had the Condominium Education Trust Fund pay for a Commission-approved third-party course.

The obstacle is structural rather than ideological. Hawaii boards are volunteers, and a mandatory training condition on service is a barrier to recruitment in associations that already struggle to fill seats. What the statute does now is softer: § 514B-107(e) requires the association, at its expense, to give every board member the declaration, bylaws, house rules and annually a copy of chapter 514B with amendments; and § 514B-107(f) permits director education expenses, which “shall not be deemed to be compensation,” provided they appear as separate line items in the approved annual operating budget.

What a board can do without legislation

• Budget director education as a separate line item, which § 514B-107(f) requires and which also makes it visible to owners.
• Actually deliver the annual chapter 514B copy that § 514B-107(e) requires. Many associations do not.
• Check your managing agent’s registration and bond, and remember the association “shall have standing to make a loss claim against the bond of the managing agent as a party covered under the bond” under § 514B-143(a)(3).
• Read § 514B-132(a)(4) before you need it: where employee fraud or dishonesty causes a loss, the managing agent must act promptly to recover from the bond and, where several associations are hurt, “divide the proceeds among the associations in proportion to each association’s loss.”

What to watch

Whether the Real Estate Commission adds condominium content to continuing education, which needs no bill, and whether licensure returns in 2027 with industry support rather than against it.