I started looking at Japan travel vids in prep for a short holiday next year and was really surprised by how many westerners have channels basically treating the place like an eccentric theme park, buying up properties to set up air bnbs they don’t even live in and basically treating the crash in the Yen as an opportunity to greedily gobble up cheap housing with no regard for the community or locals. Doesn’t seem to be any respect for the place as being a fragile eco system of family ties and generational bonds of belonging that might be harmed by the arrival of masses of newcomers. Kind of disappointing given how much of the west has been destroyed by foreigners sweeping up our own properties and moving in without regard for the locals. They should know better. I hope Japan takes a hardline stance against this opportunistic grab. I remember the hardship of the economic downturn in 2009 and how awful it felt to see foreigners using it as a lucrative opportunity to make money. It’s kind of sick when you think about it.
Almost nobody cares sadly. I don't even know why so many foreigners come to Japan, they have little earning potential and spend ALL their time complaining about the culture and acting against it in almost every way. It's a real shame for those of us that really understand and respect Japan. It's also ironic that they were the very people I was moving away from in my own country!
100% agreed. There should be limits. Maybe no more than X number of houses to be purchased as a buy-to-let for specific ward/town/city per year, and the house must be a derelic/unhabitable to force large renovation which Japanese are not willing/wealthy enough to do versus allowing investors to snatch good habitable houses from locals. Plus allowing purchase for owner occupier as long as language proficiency is at N2 minimum, to help with the integration...i dunno, just picked those on top of my head, I am sure Japanese who care about the locals and community can come up with bettter regulations
We thought about buying a cheap house in Japan, but it seems like more trouble than it’s worth in the long run. And I worry that the novelty will eventually fade and I’d be stuck with a money pit.
Foreign buyers have contributed significantly to the ruination of Australia. Rampant speculation has made Australian real estate one of the best investments in the world, with nothing to support it apart from everyone below you on the pyramid.
Same in Germany, we earn a decent salary but are being priced out of moving into a bigger flat(we’d need to sacrifice our ability to safe up money) and buying houses or flats is getting unaffordable:(
I got priced out of the Vancouver home market, couldn't keep up. Moved to Asia but everywhere I go, house prices keep skyrocketing. Guess Japan is the last frontier.
It is a rigged market. Rigged at two levels: controls on construction (e.g. zoning laws, unionized construction workers) and at the monetary level (interest rates and money supply). Basically, good behavior (e.g. saving to buy a house with cash) is penalized and bad behavior (e.g. leverage) is rewarded. If China succeeds in keeping their housing prices low, the low prices could spread around the world. This is unlikely but not impossible.
The Japanese government needs to maintain control over foreign property ownership in Japan. We had and perhaps still have an issue with foreign land banking in New Zealand. There was no official data on who was purchasing property, and it was tough for locals to enter the market because of a lack of capital.
Japan is still relatively difficult when it comes to buying property as a non-Japanese citizen. Banks for example will not give you a loan and most of the time the paper work is overwhelming. There are ways of getting around it like having your company purchase the land, but everything is still documented so we do keep track of who is buying these properties at least.
for my house in Oregon, US, I was bidding against a corporation. The next step is instead of individuals buying up stuff, corps do. House flipping as an industry. I'm guilty of half doing this, I can only afford my home by renting out rooms to other people, but I also live in it, similar to a share house in Japan. It's too bad houses can't just be treated as places to live instead of investments.
I wouldn't worry about it they all gonna get a shock when they realise houses go down here and decay. Tokyo builds more houses than London Paris new York combined. Westerners don't build new houses and import millions of immigrants and it drives the prices up. Outside of Tokyo I wouldn't worry. With the declining population. A lot of foreigners are gonna lose money on these.
Japan is making a mistake letting foreigners purchase homes there. The reason Japan is nice is because its a homogeneous society and people are raised to respect each other and their surroundings. The west has destroyed itself with diversity. Visist japan and you can see the difference with foreign tourist, especially chinese tourist, and the Japanese population.
@valcaron Eritrea and Myanmar are not homogeneous. They multi ethnic. Just because people are same colour doesn't make it homogeneous. North Korea has problem of weird communism. Also don't confuse money and community. Sometimes poor communities can have better quality of life in social terms than rich ones. Looking back I had better childhood in eastern Europe than my kids have in Australia. Maybe we have more money here, but there is no sense of community.
It's not because of homogeneity, it's because of Confucianism. Confucianism is strong in civil morals. The Western world prefers individuality which leads to disobedience. Japan is not as "homogenous" as you think, it is a VERY Westernized Asian country. A country that has been shaped by the US in many forms. Ex: 1) It was forced by the US to open its borders in 1853 and 2) the US wrote its modern constitution.
I do hope Japan is successful with revitalising the countryside. Need to get those Tokyoite salarymen & women into the babymaking phase! Regarding foreign parasite landowners, I think it will be a relatively shortlived thing. Once they figure out house prices fall over time they'll soon pack up and leave. In fact I'd say the reason they're making videos on the subject is to try and minimise their losses. Or maybe this is just my wishful thinking... There was an article I read about the Japanese getting uppity with all the Chinese investment into city real estate, so they might even stop foreigners from purchasing property altogether. I'd like to think there could still be a route for those with permanent residence tho.
The reason they want immigration to be opened up is that they want to stop those prices going down. Talk to a western elite type about Japan and you'd think the devaluing property prices, difficulty of hostile business takeovers by international conglomerates (for the conglomerates that is, the western investment class really don't like the investment laws and mutual corporate culture of Japan as they want to be able to turn a quick buck asset striping, offshoring and engaging in very dodgy financial practices like they have done everywhere else, the idea of responsibility or morality doesn't enter their head) and highschool romance fiction (unironically they always bring this up) were the main issue in Japan. Personally as a young person I find being told house prices aren't high enough a bit beyond insufferable. Such attitudes in my view utter invalidate the right to rule of the current leadership class.
Early next year i plan to expand my rural Japan cafe to include rescuing stray cats in my area to turn it into a unique Cat Cafe. Any help is very much appreciated. www.buymeacoffee.com/realruraljapan
We've had this in Ireland since independence to one extent or another. At first Americans and Europeans were the buyers, now Corporations, Indians, Chinese, Aussies, Canadians Etc basically the whole world are the buyers. Ireland has no laws against anyone buying property here. Thats why something like 50-60% of home buyers last year were foreigners. Unlike Japan Ireland is at the extreme of this. Either something changes or its over. I mean ffs 21.82% of Irelands population were not born here(2022 census results - it's only gotten bigger since then). In the end its like 30% or more of the population isn't Irish. For reference in Ireland the population was approx 98% Irish 26 years ago.
Same in the UK, we are moving out of our town. The people who work in London can't afford to live in London so they sell their property there buy two (one to live in and one to rent out) properties by us which is much cheaper. But that has raised the house prices too high for the locals. So one by one the young couples who grew up in our town all move away somewhere they can afford. Owning more than one property should be illegal. One house per family 😢
Greedy landlords are world wide issue.Prices get spiked because foreigners are coming more and more with zero care for locals that cant affort rent anymore.
See it here in Tokyo and Yokohama, kind of annoying because it ruins the chances for local people to get a house at a reasonable price. Kyoto is already insane.
this is the fear of my fellow countrymen. foreigners buying up land, artificially raising property prices then no locals are able to own any houses anymore. the shortsightedness is so bad. my government is trying to make foreign land ownership legal in my country and i am against this.
As someone who rents out apartments it’s not the done thing in Japan to increase rents for sitting tenants. I wish I could as my management fees are increasing. It takes a market with a high turnover to have rising rents.
We will come back and look at this in a few years and see just how these guys can move the market. It happens slowly at first and then...... it happens. It is happening already i have seen this movie before.
The countrysides in Japan are quite literally dying out... this notion that "foreign investors" are gonna drive people out is a bit silly no? The properties are rotting and empty because people already moved out years or decades ago and continue to do so.... but yea with all the struggle Japan is already in lets add in limiting or removing foreign investments aswell
I mentioned working class areas about 12 times and not the countryside at all but yet you say this? Come on man you can't come to this conclusion if you really paid attention.
@@chkndnts You misunderstood the video. I did say it was about foreigners buying up working class houses in working class communities about 10 times. Obviously, it wasn't enough for you but was for everyone else.
@@RealRuralJapan i think the problem is the terminology "working class" You have working class communities in towns between 5,000 and 50,000+ in Japan that are dying like crazy with 10+% of the houses having weeds growing everywhere and noone wants to buy them. No use to repeat 12 times an ambiguous terminology, ask youself why someone made that comment. Take feedback on board and think how you can improve, come on man. You act agressively, you just did the same to me in another video. I would recommend to say "working class in large urban area" to avoid ambiguity, Kobe, Yokohama, Nagoya, Osaka, Tokyo, Saporo, Fukuoka comes to mind, to name a few. But in Japan you can list 100's of towns that have a huge issue with empty houses, it is so bad that they stay on the akiya list for years, and every time I look at them the price go down.. Not saying we shuld sell them all to foreigners, i think there should always be limits, like demanding an N2 proficiency in Japanese on top of the visa requirements. ANother idea would be to allow foreigners to only buy derelic or houses in poor conditions.
It's happening everywhere. Affordable older starter homes are getting absurdly priced and new homes are huge near mansions for $1.5m+ USD in the northeast. I cannot afford to move out my starter home so I stay here. The taxes and other service costs are slowly creeping up and the quality of life in my area is slowly going down (i.e. the road are very subpar). I'll probably have to move to a different region of the country to retire or if I need to change jobs for whatever reason before I retire I'll probably have to change regions.
This is such a disappointing reality for many of us that just want to own a home in our home country. Investors, whether individuals or businesses, have been buying homes in cash because they have the capital, do a short rehab on them and then sell them for an amount out of reach of most locals. The Californians have infected anywhere near their state and have ruined the local communities with their voting and their habits (drugs, crime, horrible driving, rudeness). It's destroyed the local community because the don't participate at all on the local level other than to force laws to change for them. I used to make a decent salary a few years ago, but even with some minor raises, I might not ever be able to afford a home in the place I was raised because of the insane inflation and the bigger gap between the wealthy and the middle class. Their needs to be legislation made that businesses cannot own homes and that individuals and their immediate family cannot own too many homes. Making a huge profit from basic needs (like a place to live) is disgusting.
What you said about investors being more of a rentier class, sucking up incomes and driving rents up, and not contributing in any meaningful sense to the economy, if not even being a burden to the economy is straight out of Adam Smith's "The wealth of nations," one of the most important texts in the development of modern capitalism. I would say as much as I would wholly like to blame investors, it is really the "mom and pop" landlords and investors, who behave often in wildly irrational ways and contribute to the unaccountable speculation, which big firms love to take advantage of, because in the end, it raises their margins.
It is amazing to watch people rationalize what they do buying up working class area properties like they are doing them and the world a favor. It's just laziness and a mindset that they deserve to be paid by their lessers. This scummy rentier shenanigans used to be looked down upon with good reason. How about putting your capital into a business or venture that creates something? These portfolio types are just parasites and that book you mentioned has it right IMO as anyone who has thought about this for even a second would come to this same conclusion.
This channel is underrated. I like that you bring this topic up, I don't think this will blow up as badly as say in western countries but it does have a significant negative impact on smaller communities like you mentioned in the video. With federal interest rates starting to go up and possibly mortgage rates, we may see a small decline in people taking out loans to buy houses in urban areas simply because they will be priced out. I see new houses in my area selling for much higher than when I bought it back in 2021. Used manshon prices are definitely insane in my opinion as you could get a much better house for the price but urban dwellers love their manshons so the demand is still higher. Luckily Japanese aren't idiots so you will see them take less risks with their money. Much of the newer houses selling around me tend to be vacant for periods of up to 16 months or longer. They are then forced to slash prices before a buyer is willing to take the offer. No one wants to buy these inflated prices and those who sell products/ services with price increases will soon feel the damage that is the Japanese shufu who is a professional belt tightener.
Back in the mid 90s, I taught English in a small city in Hokkaido. Nearby were the cities of Kutchan and Niseko, home to a couple of ski areas. Back then, I was always astounded that there were cities near ski areas weren't stuffed with condos and vacation houses that were only occupied a few weeks a year and that normal people with normal jobs could afford to live there. Here in Colorado, any town near a ski area is hideously expensive and the folks who work in the shops, restaurants, and ski areas have to commute from miles away. From what I've heard, that is rapidly becoming the case in Kutchan and Niseko. Rich foreigners are buying up everything and the locals are getting priced out!
It's also happening in the snow sports areas of Nagano and Niigita. Inbound tourism has fueled this, but it does bring in a large cash bonus to the areas. Down side is that local young folk now can't afford to buy where they grew up. I bought in this area in 2007, now prices are x4 what they were.
@@treasurechest1993 I roasted these guys well on a videos on my Patreon about a year ago. And trust me i could have gone a lot harder but was feeling generous at the time.
I am really glad you are talking about this topic because it would break my heart to see what's happened to my city (Toronto) happen to Japan. Without regulation and awareness of this trend, I feel they will also fall victim to it within a short period of time. The tiktok channels and insta accounts that promote the "akiya gold rush" do not help this situation one bit and I doubt the people who hold these social media accounts care about the consequences.
Do you think requiring permanent residence for property ownership would help? Or something like legally declaring intent to become resident in X years and if not, you lose the property.
Genuine Real Estate Investment, as in replacing an existing building with something that is at least nominally better or developing less developed area, is decent & should probably be open to international investment, however, the current rentiering practice of simply buying an existing structure & renting it out should be far more restricted, as other than theoretically maintaining the building the rentier isn't doing anything to benefit anyone & thus the practice ought to be limited as to what the exact limits ought to be is a matter of debate, however, I'd say the absolute minimum eould be requiring that all structures in a country be owned by so entity eithin said country, whether it be individual citizens that reside in the country or a company that is registered within said country, even if it is merely a subsidiary of a foreign entity, as legitimate businesses need cash reseeves, which is less money taken out of the country & is an entity that can be sued & have it's assests seized without needing to other govts to cooperate
Can't give an overall answer but for me, it's about taking the money that wouldn't even be a house deposit in Australia and using it to call somewhere home, especially if that place was just going to sit dormant and be an eyesore anyway. I'm not interested in destroying the local communities or pricing people out of their homes, I just want a community I can be a part of and live in peace.
Interesting video and it has given me some food for thought, but I must ask how does one change their living to Japan w/o being a parasite? I am nowhere near a position where I could afford ANY property let alone in a different country and I am slowly learning Japanese.
Also living in Japan (I talk from a personal experience) is a "form of investment".Some Japanese saw me as a welcome novelty, and some looked at me with dislike. Married to a Japanese.
With all due respect I think your a bit off base with this. Japan is dying from their population collapse, and the young people dont want to live in the countryside. There is also problems with large inheritance taxes that the Japanese dont want to pay that contributes to the problem. Please keep in mind that Japan owned large parts of the USA in the 80s until the bubble collapse. Also, foreign investment into real estate markets often provide a lifeline to communities who desperately need it.
Did you listen at all? I didn't mention the countryside even once i was talking about the parasites buying up in already well functioning working-class communities. These people buying up the countryside they are pushing out or will push out people from these areas. I thought i was very clear i said this numerous times!
@@RealRuralJapan I apologize for the misunderstanding. I think the fact that your driving around rural Japan led me to believe you were saying the parasites were buying up houses in working class neighborhoods on the out skirts of the city forcing people into expensive city centers. I re-watched your video, and now understand that you were saying its the Japanese buying houses on the outskirts because the foreigners are buying up properties close to the city center and jacking up rent prices. Once again apologize for the misunderstanding.
Thanks for another great video. I do tend to agree that foreign ownership as you have described will and has destroyed communities in every country and left unabated it will in Japan as well. It is very sad! I'm not sure you can blame the people though...I think the blame rests with the policy makers. I would LOVE to buy in Japan....but I would only do so to live there. I want to be there and spend my money in that economy. Not a day passes that I dont regret moving there to live 20 years ago.
I've lived in Vancouver for 30-odd years. If Japan is going the same way, I feel sorry for the kids. They will never be able to afford to live there - that's what happened here.
Japanese real estate isn't an investment. I still want to buy a 2nd home in Nagano though. It is not easy doing something like that from Australia. Almost impossible I'd say.
It works as designed you just need to look closer at the results and what it means for communities. I have and don't like what i have seen. That is my opinion and yours may be different.
Have communities thought about a progressive tax system on property. For example if you live in it the tax rate is 0.5 percent but if it's an investment 2nd you pay 3% and if it's a 10 th you pay 10 percent
They just up the rent till the numbers work in their favor. It's the parasitic mentality that's the problem these people take out and not create anything and no one calls them out.
I heard of a great thing Cambodia has. Dont know if true. Foreigners are not allowed to own anything that touches the ground. Meaning they can only buy apartments. I think thats good idea.
Same in Thailand; I can take an Australian house deposit and buy a condo in Thailand right now but I can't own more than a 49% share of land (Thai national has to own the 51%). Not sure if there's exclusions though, such as mansions or commercial property. Thailand is too damn humid and the language is impossible for me to wrap my head around so I won't be living there anyway lol.
Call me a socialist but I think it should be illegal to purchase residential property as an investment. I've had people question me why I don't invest in properties and then I explain that people doing this is the exact reason why ordinary people can't afford to buy houses anymore, and then they tense up and say "it's just a small thing, can't have that big of an effect." It's not just the house prices - a lot of house sales cater only to investors now and will outright refuse you if you intend to live there. It's frankly disgusting and seeing the low Japanese prices for new houses outside Tokyo makes you realise how bad it's gotten in the west. I will be very sad if Japan succumbs to the same fate, but I am hopeful that Japan's natural catastrophes and culture will stop that from happening.
There no investments in Socialism in fact there not even a market. Housing is a human right in Socialism. There were no homeless people in East Germany or even USSR
Ive noticed since the yen has weakened that there seem to be a craze of people coming to japan and pronoucing themselves as ,"investors" or "entrepreneurs". When in reality theyre poor from their respective countries but somewhat comfortable in japan due to the conversation rate (depending on the currency). No offense, but I think japan is a horrible place to start a buisiness in and to invest into a house yield wise. If i remember, taxes on buinesses are among one of the highest compared to many countries.
You can start a business here with very limited money compared to Australia i don't where you get that impression from. Taxes are the same. Japan is a far better place to start a business.
I started looking at Japan travel vids in prep for a short holiday next year and was really surprised by how many westerners have channels basically treating the place like an eccentric theme park, buying up properties to set up air bnbs they don’t even live in and basically treating the crash in the Yen as an opportunity to greedily gobble up cheap housing with no regard for the community or locals. Doesn’t seem to be any respect for the place as being a fragile eco system of family ties and generational bonds of belonging that might be harmed by the arrival of masses of newcomers. Kind of disappointing given how much of the west has been destroyed by foreigners sweeping up our own properties and moving in without regard for the locals. They should know better. I hope Japan takes a hardline stance against this opportunistic grab. I remember the hardship of the economic downturn in 2009 and how awful it felt to see foreigners using it as a lucrative opportunity to make money. It’s kind of sick when you think about it.
Almost nobody cares sadly. I don't even know why so many foreigners come to Japan, they have little earning potential and spend ALL their time complaining about the culture and acting against it in almost every way. It's a real shame for those of us that really understand and respect Japan. It's also ironic that they were the very people I was moving away from in my own country!
100% agreed. There should be limits. Maybe no more than X number of houses to be purchased as a buy-to-let for specific ward/town/city per year, and the house must be a derelic/unhabitable to force large renovation which Japanese are not willing/wealthy enough to do versus allowing investors to snatch good habitable houses from locals. Plus allowing purchase for owner occupier as long as language proficiency is at N2 minimum, to help with the integration...i dunno, just picked those on top of my head, I am sure Japanese who care about the locals and community can come up with bettter regulations
We thought about buying a cheap house in Japan, but it seems like more trouble than it’s worth in the long run. And I worry that the novelty will eventually fade and I’d be stuck with a money pit.
Foreign buyers have contributed significantly to the ruination of Australia. Rampant speculation has made Australian real estate one of the best investments in the world, with nothing to support it apart from everyone below you on the pyramid.
Same in Germany, we earn a decent salary but are being priced out of moving into a bigger flat(we’d need to sacrifice our ability to safe up money) and buying houses or flats is getting unaffordable:(
I got priced out of the Vancouver home market, couldn't keep up. Moved to Asia but everywhere I go, house prices keep skyrocketing. Guess Japan is the last frontier.
It's getting out of control everywhere it seems.
@@RealRuralJapan Well the Chinese market is crashing, but that's China lol
It is a rigged market. Rigged at two levels: controls on construction (e.g. zoning laws, unionized construction workers) and at the monetary level (interest rates and money supply).
Basically, good behavior (e.g. saving to buy a house with cash) is penalized and bad behavior (e.g. leverage) is rewarded.
If China succeeds in keeping their housing prices low, the low prices could spread around the world. This is unlikely but not impossible.
All economies are manipulated by bankers. Too much prosperity is bad for the loan business.
@@GabrieliaVinckeviciute bot
The Japanese government needs to maintain control over foreign property ownership in Japan.
We had and perhaps still have an issue with foreign land banking in New Zealand. There was no official data on who was purchasing property, and it was tough for locals to enter the market because of a lack of capital.
New Zealand is on another level. I had my honeymoon there and everything was reasonable now it's off the charts expensive.
@@RealRuralJapan, yes, particularly in Auckland. Most people can't buy, so they are forced to rent.
Japan is still relatively difficult when it comes to buying property as a non-Japanese citizen. Banks for example will not give you a loan and most of the time the paper work is overwhelming. There are ways of getting around it like having your company purchase the land, but everything is still documented so we do keep track of who is buying these properties at least.
@@murraycrosbee5873 that’s why we left Auckland in 2015. It was bad then so I hate to think what it’s like now.
for my house in Oregon, US, I was bidding against a corporation. The next step is instead of individuals buying up stuff, corps do. House flipping as an industry. I'm guilty of half doing this, I can only afford my home by renting out rooms to other people, but I also live in it, similar to a share house in Japan. It's too bad houses can't just be treated as places to live instead of investments.
I wouldn't worry about it they all gonna get a shock when they realise houses go down here and decay. Tokyo builds more houses than London Paris new York combined. Westerners don't build new houses and import millions of immigrants and it drives the prices up.
Outside of Tokyo I wouldn't worry. With the declining population.
A lot of foreigners are gonna lose money on these.
Japan is making a mistake letting foreigners purchase homes there. The reason Japan is nice is because its a homogeneous society and people are raised to respect each other and their surroundings. The west has destroyed itself with diversity. Visist japan and you can see the difference with foreign tourist, especially chinese tourist, and the Japanese population.
the west was never a nice, peaceful society, and diversity isn't the reason for this. I'm american and have visited/lived in many countries btw.
@valcaron Eritrea and Myanmar are not homogeneous. They multi ethnic. Just because people are same colour doesn't make it homogeneous. North Korea has problem of weird communism. Also don't confuse money and community. Sometimes poor communities can have better quality of life in social terms than rich ones.
Looking back I had better childhood in eastern Europe than my kids have in Australia. Maybe we have more money here, but there is no sense of community.
@potatokilr7789 Oh, it hasn't? I didn't notice. If it wasn't FOR the west, the world would be a far LESS peaceful place.
@valcaron If you can't see the answer in your own reply, maybe you shouldn't post...
It's not because of homogeneity, it's because of Confucianism. Confucianism is strong in civil morals. The Western world prefers individuality which leads to disobedience. Japan is not as "homogenous" as you think, it is a VERY Westernized Asian country. A country that has been shaped by the US in many forms. Ex: 1) It was forced by the US to open its borders in 1853 and 2) the US wrote its modern constitution.
I do hope Japan is successful with revitalising the countryside. Need to get those Tokyoite salarymen & women into the babymaking phase!
Regarding foreign parasite landowners, I think it will be a relatively shortlived thing. Once they figure out house prices fall over time they'll soon pack up and leave. In fact I'd say the reason they're making videos on the subject is to try and minimise their losses. Or maybe this is just my wishful thinking...
There was an article I read about the Japanese getting uppity with all the Chinese investment into city real estate, so they might even stop foreigners from purchasing property altogether. I'd like to think there could still be a route for those with permanent residence tho.
The reason they want immigration to be opened up is that they want to stop those prices going down.
Talk to a western elite type about Japan and you'd think the devaluing property prices, difficulty of hostile business takeovers by international conglomerates (for the conglomerates that is, the western investment class really don't like the investment laws and mutual corporate culture of Japan as they want to be able to turn a quick buck asset striping, offshoring and engaging in very dodgy financial practices like they have done everywhere else, the idea of responsibility or morality doesn't enter their head) and highschool romance fiction (unironically they always bring this up) were the main issue in Japan.
Personally as a young person I find being told house prices aren't high enough a bit beyond insufferable. Such attitudes in my view utter invalidate the right to rule of the current leadership class.
Early next year i plan to expand my rural Japan cafe to include rescuing stray cats in my area to turn it into a unique Cat Cafe. Any help is very much appreciated.
www.buymeacoffee.com/realruraljapan
We've had this in Ireland since independence to one extent or another.
At first Americans and Europeans were the buyers, now Corporations, Indians, Chinese, Aussies, Canadians Etc basically the whole world are the buyers.
Ireland has no laws against anyone buying property here. Thats why something like 50-60% of home buyers last year were foreigners.
Unlike Japan Ireland is at the extreme of this. Either something changes or its over.
I mean ffs 21.82% of Irelands population were not born here(2022 census results - it's only gotten bigger since then).
In the end its like 30% or more of the population isn't Irish. For reference in Ireland the population was approx 98% Irish 26 years ago.
Thanks for video
No worries.
Same in the UK, we are moving out of our town. The people who work in London can't afford to live in London so they sell their property there buy two (one to live in and one to rent out) properties by us which is much cheaper. But that has raised the house prices too high for the locals. So one by one the young couples who grew up in our town all move away somewhere they can afford. Owning more than one property should be illegal. One house per family 😢
Well presented...
We can really barely hear your audio.
Greedy landlords are world wide issue.Prices get spiked because foreigners are coming more and more with zero care for locals that cant affort rent anymore.
See it here in Tokyo and Yokohama, kind of annoying because it ruins the chances for local people to get a house at a reasonable price. Kyoto is already insane.
this is the fear of my fellow countrymen. foreigners buying up land, artificially raising property prices then no locals are able to own any houses anymore. the shortsightedness is so bad. my government is trying to make foreign land ownership legal in my country and i am against this.
As someone who rents out apartments it’s not the done thing in Japan to increase rents for sitting tenants. I wish I could as my management fees are increasing. It takes a market with a high turnover to have rising rents.
We will come back and look at this in a few years and see just how these guys can move the market. It happens slowly at first and then...... it happens. It is happening already i have seen this movie before.
The countrysides in Japan are quite literally dying out... this notion that "foreign investors" are gonna drive people out is a bit silly no? The properties are rotting and empty because people already moved out years or decades ago and continue to do so.... but yea with all the struggle Japan is already in lets add in limiting or removing foreign investments aswell
I mentioned working class areas about 12 times and not the countryside at all but yet you say this? Come on man you can't come to this conclusion if you really paid attention.
@@chkndnts You misunderstood the video. I did say it was about foreigners buying up working class houses in working class communities about 10 times. Obviously, it wasn't enough for you but was for everyone else.
@@RealRuralJapan i think the problem is the terminology "working class" You have working class communities in towns between 5,000 and 50,000+ in Japan that are dying like crazy with 10+% of the houses having weeds growing everywhere and noone wants to buy them. No use to repeat 12 times an ambiguous terminology, ask youself why someone made that comment. Take feedback on board and think how you can improve, come on man. You act agressively, you just did the same to me in another video. I would recommend to say "working class in large urban area" to avoid ambiguity, Kobe, Yokohama, Nagoya, Osaka, Tokyo, Saporo, Fukuoka comes to mind, to name a few. But in Japan you can list 100's of towns that have a huge issue with empty houses, it is so bad that they stay on the akiya list for years, and every time I look at them the price go down.. Not saying we shuld sell them all to foreigners, i think there should always be limits, like demanding an N2 proficiency in Japanese on top of the visa requirements. ANother idea would be to allow foreigners to only buy derelic or houses in poor conditions.
It's happening everywhere. Affordable older starter homes are getting absurdly priced and new homes are huge near mansions for $1.5m+ USD in the northeast. I cannot afford to move out my starter home so I stay here. The taxes and other service costs are slowly creeping up and the quality of life in my area is slowly going down (i.e. the road are very subpar). I'll probably have to move to a different region of the country to retire or if I need to change jobs for whatever reason before I retire I'll probably have to change regions.
Your comments about the Rentier class are very true. Unfortunately, it's often like a tidal wave that's hard to stop.
This is such a disappointing reality for many of us that just want to own a home in our home country. Investors, whether individuals or businesses, have been buying homes in cash because they have the capital, do a short rehab on them and then sell them for an amount out of reach of most locals. The Californians have infected anywhere near their state and have ruined the local communities with their voting and their habits (drugs, crime, horrible driving, rudeness). It's destroyed the local community because the don't participate at all on the local level other than to force laws to change for them. I used to make a decent salary a few years ago, but even with some minor raises, I might not ever be able to afford a home in the place I was raised because of the insane inflation and the bigger gap between the wealthy and the middle class. Their needs to be legislation made that businesses cannot own homes and that individuals and their immediate family cannot own too many homes. Making a huge profit from basic needs (like a place to live) is disgusting.
Can you get a different microphone? Really having a hard time hearing you in the car.
What you said about investors being more of a rentier class, sucking up incomes and driving rents up, and not contributing in any meaningful sense to the economy, if not even being a burden to the economy is straight out of Adam Smith's "The wealth of nations," one of the most important texts in the development of modern capitalism. I would say as much as I would wholly like to blame investors, it is really the "mom and pop" landlords and investors, who behave often in wildly irrational ways and contribute to the unaccountable speculation, which big firms love to take advantage of, because in the end, it raises their margins.
It is amazing to watch people rationalize what they do buying up working class area properties like they are doing them and the world a favor. It's just laziness and a mindset that they deserve to be paid by their lessers. This scummy rentier shenanigans used to be looked down upon with good reason. How about putting your capital into a business or venture that creates something? These portfolio types are just parasites and that book you mentioned has it right IMO as anyone who has thought about this for even a second would come to this same conclusion.
This channel is underrated. I like that you bring this topic up, I don't think this will blow up as badly as say in western countries but it does have a significant negative impact on smaller communities like you mentioned in the video.
With federal interest rates starting to go up and possibly mortgage rates, we may see a small decline in people taking out loans to buy houses in urban areas simply because they will be priced out. I see new houses in my area selling for much higher than when I bought it back in 2021. Used manshon prices are definitely insane in my opinion as you could get a much better house for the price but urban dwellers love their manshons so the demand is still higher.
Luckily Japanese aren't idiots so you will see them take less risks with their money. Much of the newer houses selling around me tend to be vacant for periods of up to 16 months or longer. They are then forced to slash prices before a buyer is willing to take the offer. No one wants to buy these inflated prices and those who sell products/ services with price increases will soon feel the damage that is the Japanese shufu who is a professional belt tightener.
The housewives now were the ones who were kids in the bubble so it will be interesting to see what happens.
@@RealRuralJapan indeed
So true
I want japan to keep being japan. I don’t agree with the foreigners.
Back in the mid 90s, I taught English in a small city in Hokkaido. Nearby were the cities of Kutchan and Niseko, home to a couple of ski areas. Back then, I was always astounded that there were cities near ski areas weren't stuffed with condos and vacation houses that were only occupied a few weeks a year and that normal people with normal jobs could afford to live there. Here in Colorado, any town near a ski area is hideously expensive and the folks who work in the shops, restaurants, and ski areas have to commute from miles away. From what I've heard, that is rapidly becoming the case in Kutchan and Niseko. Rich foreigners are buying up everything and the locals are getting priced out!
Yep, they aren't investing in the areas where it is needed hence the title of the video.
It's also happening in the snow sports areas of Nagano and Niigita. Inbound tourism has fueled this, but it does bring in a large cash bonus to the areas. Down side is that local young folk now can't afford to buy where they grew up. I bought in this area in 2007, now prices are x4 what they were.
@@treasurechest1993 I roasted these guys well on a videos on my Patreon about a year ago. And trust me i could have gone a lot harder but was feeling generous at the time.
@@RealRuralJapan ?? What guys. Not sure who you mean.
The ski field foreigners.
I am really glad you are talking about this topic because it would break my heart to see what's happened to my city (Toronto) happen to Japan. Without regulation and awareness of this trend, I feel they will also fall victim to it within a short period of time. The tiktok channels and insta accounts that promote the "akiya gold rush" do not help this situation one bit and I doubt the people who hold these social media accounts care about the consequences.
Of course, they don't and neither do their followers. Sad people.
Vultures! FYI, there was a clonking sound for most of the video, otherwise interesting topic!
way too much road noise
Chinese are buying the expensive condos in Tokyo
Do you think requiring permanent residence for property ownership would help? Or something like legally declaring intent to become resident in X years and if not, you lose the property.
No
Genuine Real Estate Investment, as in replacing an existing building with something that is at least nominally better or developing less developed area, is decent & should probably be open to international investment, however, the current rentiering practice of simply buying an existing structure & renting it out should be far more restricted, as other than theoretically maintaining the building the rentier isn't doing anything to benefit anyone & thus the practice ought to be limited as to what the exact limits ought to be is a matter of debate, however, I'd say the absolute minimum eould be requiring that all structures in a country be owned by so entity eithin said country, whether it be individual citizens that reside in the country or a company that is registered within said country, even if it is merely a subsidiary of a foreign entity, as legitimate businesses need cash reseeves, which is less money taken out of the country & is an entity that can be sued & have it's assests seized without needing to other govts to cooperate
Why do foreigners want to buy property in Japan when it loses value?
Higher rental yields in many areas and some areas have good capital gain. They aren't revitalizing anything they are sponging.
Can't give an overall answer but for me, it's about taking the money that wouldn't even be a house deposit in Australia and using it to call somewhere home, especially if that place was just going to sit dormant and be an eyesore anyway. I'm not interested in destroying the local communities or pricing people out of their homes, I just want a community I can be a part of and live in peace.
Interesting video and it has given me some food for thought, but I must ask how does one change their living to Japan w/o being a parasite?
I am nowhere near a position where I could afford ANY property let alone in a different country and I am slowly learning Japanese.
Maybe start a business or do something productive instead of living off other people's rent? Plenty of ways not to be parasitic.
I get it but there is worse. Us they dont buy they only take and destroy having the audacity to claim they are victims
Also living in Japan (I talk from a personal experience) is a "form of investment".Some Japanese saw me as a welcome novelty, and some looked at me with dislike. Married to a Japanese.
Every one uf us knows a gentrifier or two..
With all due respect I think your a bit off base with this. Japan is dying from their population collapse, and the young people dont want to live in the countryside. There is also problems with large inheritance taxes that the Japanese dont want to pay that contributes to the problem. Please keep in mind that Japan owned large parts of the USA in the 80s until the bubble collapse. Also, foreign investment into real estate markets often provide a lifeline to communities who desperately need it.
Did you listen at all? I didn't mention the countryside even once i was talking about the parasites buying up in already well functioning working-class communities. These people buying up the countryside they are pushing out or will push out people from these areas. I thought i was very clear i said this numerous times!
@@RealRuralJapan I apologize for the misunderstanding. I think the fact that your driving around rural Japan led me to believe you were saying the parasites were buying up houses in working class neighborhoods on the out skirts of the city forcing people into expensive city centers. I re-watched your video, and now understand that you were saying its the Japanese buying houses on the outskirts because the foreigners are buying up properties close to the city center and jacking up rent prices. Once again apologize for the misunderstanding.
Thanks for another great video.
I do tend to agree that foreign ownership as you have described will and has destroyed communities in every country and left unabated it will in Japan as well. It is very sad! I'm not sure you can blame the people though...I think the blame rests with the policy makers.
I would LOVE to buy in Japan....but I would only do so to live there. I want to be there and spend my money in that economy. Not a day passes that I dont regret moving there to live 20 years ago.
I've lived in Vancouver for 30-odd years. If Japan is going the same way, I feel sorry for the kids. They will never be able to afford to live there - that's what happened here.
It seems to be.
Japanese real estate isn't an investment. I still want to buy a 2nd home in Nagano though. It is not easy doing something like that from Australia. Almost impossible I'd say.
People, shouldnt be allowed to own more than 2 houses imho. Way too many landlord empires out there
I'm sorry but you have zero idea how housing markets or housing policy works
It works as designed you just need to look closer at the results and what it means for communities. I have and don't like what i have seen. That is my opinion and yours may be different.
Have communities thought about a progressive tax system on property. For example if you live in it the tax rate is 0.5 percent but if it's an investment 2nd you pay 3% and if it's a 10 th you pay 10 percent
They just up the rent till the numbers work in their favor. It's the parasitic mentality that's the problem these people take out and not create anything and no one calls them out.
I heard of a great thing Cambodia has. Dont know if true. Foreigners are not allowed to own anything that touches the ground. Meaning they can only buy apartments. I think thats good idea.
Same in Thailand; I can take an Australian house deposit and buy a condo in Thailand right now but I can't own more than a 49% share of land (Thai national has to own the 51%). Not sure if there's exclusions though, such as mansions or commercial property.
Thailand is too damn humid and the language is impossible for me to wrap my head around so I won't be living there anyway lol.
Call me a socialist but I think it should be illegal to purchase residential property as an investment. I've had people question me why I don't invest in properties and then I explain that people doing this is the exact reason why ordinary people can't afford to buy houses anymore, and then they tense up and say "it's just a small thing, can't have that big of an effect." It's not just the house prices - a lot of house sales cater only to investors now and will outright refuse you if you intend to live there. It's frankly disgusting and seeing the low Japanese prices for new houses outside Tokyo makes you realise how bad it's gotten in the west. I will be very sad if Japan succumbs to the same fate, but I am hopeful that Japan's natural catastrophes and culture will stop that from happening.
There no investments in Socialism in fact there not even a market. Housing is a human right in Socialism. There were no homeless people in East Germany or even USSR
Ive noticed since the yen has weakened that there seem to be a craze of people coming to japan and pronoucing themselves as ,"investors" or "entrepreneurs". When in reality theyre poor from their respective countries but somewhat comfortable in japan due to the conversation rate (depending on the currency).
No offense, but I think japan is a horrible place to start a buisiness in and to invest into a house yield wise. If i remember, taxes on buinesses are among one of the highest compared to many countries.
You can start a business here with very limited money compared to Australia i don't where you get that impression from. Taxes are the same. Japan is a far better place to start a business.
This paracite is downvoting your video and reporting it as hatefull speech🤣😂🫡