My Desultory Blog

Do you accept credit cards??? I’m in!!!

Hi, Is Blue Lagoon Island still for sale?

Yes Pam, as far as I can tell. It was purchased in 1999 for 10 million, appraised at about 23 million a couple years ago and the asking is now 33 million. Interested … or perhaps you just want to ‘check it out in person?’

Anyway … here are a few others that were purchased in the past:

• Daydream Island on Australia’s great Barrier Reef $120 million
• Te’tiaroa Atoll, formerly owned by Marlon Brando $20 million
• Musha Caye Resort, Caribbean $56.5 million
• Caye Chapel Island Resort Belize $55 million
• Mago Island Fiji was just purchased by actor Mel Gibson $15 million
• Laucala Island Fiji, owned by Malcolm Forbes, sold several year ago for $10 million

I’ve done a bunch of research, including identifying quotes from the owner (or at least he was the owner when the resort was being developed), the Katafanga Island Resort and Spa’s parent company’s ‘confidential’ offer memorandum, and ‘valuations’. According to the owner, it was actually purchased for $2million, in 1992 or so (as I recall for the date). The $10million was just a claimed estimate in 1999 or so. The company did do a bunch of construction of the resort, but then seemed to stop completely in about 2003 (and even that was after a couple of of years of slow down). I don’t know why they stopped; however, I highly suspect because they did some more closer number crunching, and realized that it was not economically viable (certainly my more critical analysis of the numbers they used made me think this). Also, sure they invested a bunch of money (on the runway, roadway, a START on the buildings); but some of the assests they quote seem to be gone (such as the shipping arm and the airplane arm), and the uncompleted assests on the island are exposed to the elements and as far as I can tell are rusting notably. Also, be careful how you take their numbers; as far as I can tell, some of the numbers that I’ve seen are in Fiji dollars (which is about 0.55 American) … but this isn’t always clearly conveyed. Finally, personally I have extremely little faith in the ‘valuation’ they offer – to me at least, it came off as a document produced by the marketing department. In today’s (2011) market, I suspect that the island is worth far less, particularly if the resort business is not strongly economically viable. By way of comparison, it appears that nearby Mango Island (5000 acres, as I recall) went for $14millon (before the recent economic downturn), and there is an island only slightly smaller than ‘blue lagoon / Katafanga island’ but MUCH MUCH closer to the tourists centers (keep in mind that ‘blue lagoon / Katafanga island’ is NOT near any notable tourist center) that is being offered at $7million. (note: these are all just opinions; I have no direct facts, and all of the indirect facts that I have are from the internet)