Bayshore Towers

As a past resident of Hawaii for half a year (would have been longer if the DOE didn’t wait months to hire me back!), I stayed here for a couple of weeks when I first moved to town and this place definitely has pros and cons.
Pros–
— the apartment sizes are very comfortable
— nice pool with ocean views (I enjoyed eating outside)
— rec room with a pool table
— very few kids in the building (quiet building)
— walking distance to downtown
— one of the only few buildings in town with mainly professional and retired people (opposed to county)
— good upkeep
Cons–
— thin walls (I heard EVERYTHING next door)
— horrible parking lot with very narrow spaces ¼ of which have these huge squared cement poles which I banged my car into 1 time
— you hear every single plane
— if you are on the side facing downtown you will hear traffic at all hours (trust me on this and I usually sleep through everything)
— the 11 minute dryers are a pain in the ass
— some sketchy people who hang out in the parking lot (probably from the lower income places across the highway)
Wouldn’t be a bad place to buy a condo IMO if you do not face the highway. While their HOA is high, they include the electricity which is very, very high in HI. If I am here long term I would consider buying a condo here.
This is one of the few nice condos in town. If you are looking into buying in Hilo, most of the condos are dumps. This is one of the «upscale» ones. If in any mainland city this wouldn’t be considered upscale at all, but by HI standards it is.
I spent weeks looking for a decent rental in Hilo. By decent, I mean by CA standards (and yes, they hate us for thinking you should hire exterminators when you are infested with roaches and termites!!). The only decent rentals are the most expensive properties in Hilo which are 3 condos (many are rentals though) on Kalanianaole, Hilo Lagoon, and Bayshore Tower. The apartments on Kalanianaole are in my dream location but were out of my price range. Bayshore Tower would have been my backup choice. You could easily get a 6 month studio rental furnished with all bills included (aside from internet) for $ 700-​$ 900 ($ 900 being for an oceanview).
Do not waste your time renting a house in Hilo. With the exception of my buddy’s house, all the houses were falling apart and infested with termites and roaches. In the last house I stayed in, roaches regularly came out of the outlets so I had to put tape over them, and regardless of how clean the kitchen was, they were always there too.
If you are bug phobic like me and live in HI, ONLY live in a cement building! Everyone I knew in the fancier places never saw a bug in their unit or rarely saw one.
Glad to be back in CA and to only come back to HI as a place to vacation! I miss Hilo to some extent but felt like I was living in a third world country.