Hawaii’s Historic and Oft-Filmed Dillingham Ranch Sells for $36.5 Million

Location Oahu, Hawaii

Price $36.5 million

Year 1913

Specs 3,000 square feet, 8 bedrooms, plus 2 guest houses

Lot Size 2,721-acre ranch plus an 18.8-acre oceanfront lot

Dillingham Ranch, one of Hawaii’s most popular filming locations, is officially off the market! Initially listed in October 2020 for $45 million, the massive site, which comprises an 18.8-acre

oceanfront polo field (home to the Hawaii Polo Club) and a 2,721-acre working cattle ranch, was just snapped up in early March for $36.5 million. Though selling agent Neal Norman of Hawai’i Life declined to disclose information regarding the buyer, Yahoo! News recently reported that the property was sold to Peter J. Nolan, chairman of the Hermosa Beach-based Nolan Captial, Inc. investment firm, who boasts an extensive background in agriculture.

Nestled in the bluffs of Waialua on Oahu’s North Shore, the insanely idyllic locale “stretches from the oceanfront at Kai’ahulu Beach to the ridgeline of the Waianae Mountain range, bordering the Mokulē‘ia Forest Reserve” and “includes over 1,125 linear feet of ocean frontage and upland views of Ka’ena Point to the world-famous big wave surfing beaches,” as the listing detailed.

(Photo :  Hawai`i Life)

According to a Historic Resources Evaluation, the sprawling property started life in the 1880s as a rice farm originally established by a Portuguese transplant named Gaspar Silva. In 1897, the verdant acreage was purchased by its namesake, Oahu Railway & Land Company founder

Benjamin Franklin Dillingham, who initially dubbed his new homestead “Mokuleia Ranch.” At the time, it consisted of 12 artesian wells utilized for rice manufacturing and a small residence, which remains intact today and is currently known as the “Dollhouse.”

Benjamin’s eldest son, Walter Francis Dillingham, began managing the land in the early 1900s, operating it as a family estate and summer getaway. Born in 1875 and later deemed “Hawaii’s greatest builder,” Walter was one of the leading developers of the city of Honolulu, responsible for “the

dredging of the Ala Wai Canal, construction of Ala Moana Park and Ala Moana Center, the dredging of Pearl Harbor as a naval base and the building of Honolulu Airport on reclaimed land,” as the Honolulu Star-Bulletin chronicled in a 1999 feature.

Ref: Hawaii’s Historic and Oft-Filmed Dillingham Ranch Sells for $36.5 Million (Dirt)