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Buying a home in Japan sounds like a fantasy until you meet the people who actually make it happen.
YukiHomes Presents is a show about Japan... its houses, its regions, and what it really takes for a foreigner to own a piece of it. From the snow country of Hokkaido and Nagano to the cities, coasts, and small towns in between, it's a look at the country through the eyes of the people who help others put down a stake in it.
Every episode goes deep on one thing. Sometimes that's property: what an akiya is and why old Japanese houses sell for the price of a used car, how a foreigner actually buys and renovates a home, which regions are worth it and which are hype. Sometimes it's everything around the houses: the food, the seasons, the onsen towns and ski hills, the design and craft, the culture, and the parts of doing this that are harder than anyone admits.
Hosted by Nick and Derek, co-founders of YukiHomes, and Grant (YukiHomes PR & Media Lead). Along the way you'll meet the builders, guides, shop owners, and buyers who know this country better than any guidebook.
No top-10 travel lists. Just honest conversations about Japan, and what it takes to own a piece of it.
New episodes every other week.
www.yukihomes.com
www.nipponhomes.com
Japanese people don't actually
work as hard as people think.
That's more of the statement.
Okay, yeah, yeah.
Two I would say two as well.
Yeah. So you kind of agree.
I'm a one. I'm a hard one on that.
Do you know what it is though?
I gave it a two because I feel like there
are
some that do work hard,
like genuinely do work
Yeah, of course.
hard, but I feel like a lot of the time
when they are working hard,
quote unquote, it's they're they're doing
things that make them look busy,
but they're not doing productive work,
Exactly.
if that makes sense.
Round number three.
Japanese lifestyle.
Almost finished,
guys. Okay, so number nine.
You don't need to speak Japanese to live
a happy life here.
Translation apps and a bit of effort
are enough. Three,
two, one.
Ooh so
No way. I mean,
we have a four for Derek and
I guess to live a happy
a two for Nick.
life. To live a happy life,
no way. Probably not.
You no way. No.
But to have a happy vacation.
Yeah. Happy vacation.
Okay. Mm.
I think the most important part of what
you just said is a little bit of effort
goes a long way.
Yeah. Like learning
Mm.
how to say hi and please and even ordering
food or whatever.
Is huge. I think in any country,
but Japan especially,
Yeah.
because
they do take their culture and language
seriously and understanding at least
enough to be considered,
okay, this person's trying,
I think is then you get a lot more help.
But but I I don't think you could live
a full life and just live in Japan
and not speak Japanese.
That seems crazy.
Yeah.
I guess it I guess maybe Tokyo.
You could. Yeah,
you'd be just in some circles.
Mm, mm.
Yeah, you'd be in a foreigner bubble.
And you could probably live a good life,
Yeah.
I guess. But I was thinking just like
O Taru, you wouldn't be able to interact
with like any of the people at the rest
of I guess if you're super introverted,
yeah, you'd be fine.
Yeah, I guess what's a happy life?
The
Yeah. For my personal happy life,
like me just chatting people out,
couldn't do it.
I would need to know Japanese.
Yeah, yeah.
Even just the little me and Nick no goes
such a long way.
when we were surfing,
we would just hit them with a tanoshi
so or a
Mm.
point to a wave coming and just be like
okinami, which means which means big wave.
Okinami. And they would just be pumped.
like the smallest effort makes such
a big difference.
Yeah. Yeah, literally the smallest effort
we could possibly do.
You guys are doing
Ha ha
as little as possible.
No, we're trying a lot.
Or like um some funny Japanese terms
to learn, like when you're there.
Like just say Yoparai when you're
at the bar, like point to your friend
and just be like Yo Bai,
Yeah.
which just
means he like he's a drunk.
Like they love stuff like that.
We Sacho. Shacho means boss.
We say that a lot.
We hit everyone with the shot.
It probably gets super
Um
gussed.
we have a friend,
we were just at a wedding,
and our friend was like,
I've heard like Japanese people
are so like buttoned up and so serious
and like blah blah blah.
And I'm like, I couldn't disagree more.
They are like the funniest people.
Like, as soon as you start joking,
Mm.
like they are so down to just
say ridiculously crazy things.
Yeah.
Don't you agree,
V, or no? What's your take on that
I 100% agree.
one through four?
I feel like a lot of the Japanese people
I've met here are like some of the most
eccentric people I've ever come across.
They're literally
like doing their own thing.
It's wild.
That's funny.
take number ten.
Japanese summer is worse than Japanese
winter. The humidity,
the bugs, the heat.
Winter wins every time.
Three, two, one.
Ain't even close.
Definitely in Tokyo.
Nice.
I wasn't there when they went
in the summer. no.
And I'm so glad I wasn't.
Walking around in a hundred ten degree
Fahrenheit sounds terrible.
It was so bad. And the winter,
you could just add more clothes.
And there's snow everywhere.
So it's it's beautiful.
you're in not that it's not beautiful
in the summer, but in the summer I'm like
dazed. I feel like everything's hazy.
I'm tired. And I sweat so easy.
So me in one ten degree Japanese summer,
which is like 40 plus Celsius,
Mm.
brutal. I had like menthol spray that
I was soaking my body in.
I had a fan on my face and I
had a UV umbrella and I was dying.
One of our partner agents this summer
broke out. Like his skin had a crazy rash
just from the heat.
Yeah.
Really?
Yeah, I don't know what it was.
Yeah. But it seems brutal.
Damn yeah.
What
do you do in the summer?
My hot take is I love summers here.
Wow. Normally I would say
I adore the heat
I like the heat,
but even when it's brutally hot,
you you like it.
there was times in summer that I still
had the heating on because it wasn't
hot enough.
my god. What's your house temperature
Like yeah, I'm crazy.
set to? your what's your like
around tw
good sleeping tent?
My good sleeping temperature during
s winter time when I have like the heating
on all the time,
probably like thirty-five,
thirty-six.
35. No, no, no.
I need to Google that Celsius.
No, no, no. That's ninety five degrees.
Degrees Celsius,
Celsius.
Yeah, that's ninety five Celsius.
Degrees Celsius.
You're dying. You're in
a sauna. No. You're crazy.
Yeah. The the more
That's not true.
You're crazy, B.
sauna the better.
That's insane. You're crazy.
I would die. think I would die.
It's lit it's literally perfect to me.
One time I was in my van.
It's a Filipino in you.
Yeah, I was in my van and obviously there
Yeah.
was
no air conditioner.
Sleeping in my van
Mm.
in Nashville in the summer and it was like
85 or 90 out and it stayed that
hot through the night.
I didn't sleep.
I laid there soaking my bed in sweat.
Really?
Yeah, just dying.
So angry for like eight hours.
Just woke up, immediately drove as fast
as I could to go.
How did you turn the van on?
'Cause I don't it's not good
for the van to just run it for eight hours
with the AC blasting.
Yeah, but just to get to sleep.
I know, but I don't want to do that.
I don't know. It was also like
Yeah.
a source of pride.
I was like, I have to get through this
night. You know?
Yeah, you're proud.
And then I got to Colorado and just like
went as high up as I could into
the mountains to like cool off.
Drove f forty hours.
No, it was like it was now I guess Nash
yeah, it like eighteen hours.
Eighteen. Yeah.
Just to escape the heat?
Yeah. It worked.
I slept good that night.
What's the hottest it gets in the US?
Florida's like Japan.
Death Valley's like the hottest
one of the hottest places on earth
and it's in the US.
okay. Yeah,
It's just a desert that no one lives,
but
yeah.
where people live,
maybe it's different 'cause like where
Nick lives so different and Florida
are like desert versus like humid tropical
climates. So like Florida is more
Mm mm.
is closer to what Japan feels like,
where where Nick lives,
Mm.
even when it's hot,
it doesn't feel as hot 'cause it's like
zero degree zero percent humidity.
But
Yeah.
Florida, Florida in the summer is brutal.
Where me and Nick lived in North Carolina
in the summer is pretty brutal.
Mm-hmm.
It can be forty Celsius.
Yeah, it's always the humidity.
Yeah.
The humidity kills you.
Yeah, yeah.
And the craziest part is Japanese people
are in head to toe pants and suit jackets
in Tokyo and they're not sweating.
Yeah,
dude, there's some girls that have
the full cover.
they have the the visor,
the mask, the art sleeves and everything
just to get away from the sun.
And I'm just thinking,
how are you surviving under that?
Crazy. Well they have those vests now with
the with the fans.
We saw a lot of people in Miyazaki wearing
yeah yeah.
them actually.
Yeah. I've never seen someone
in the US wear one.
Probably feels so good.
F1 drivers have them.
I've noticed them recently.
They're wearing like the vest with
the fan inside.
really?
yeah, yeah.
That's fine.
They probably got it from the Japanese
or something.
take number eleven.
The paperwork, the stamps,
the forms, Japanese bureaucracy is part
of the charm and people should stop
complaining. Three,
two, one.
Two and four. I did four.
Derek did two. I did a two.
Two and four. Ooh.
I'm just not a fan.
Okay, explain yourselves.
I think the way that we're operating
in it is great,
but I'm just not a fan of any like super
Mm.
government run bureaucratic process
personally. It
Mm.
ain't for me. Yeah,
I I don't love it,
but I think maybe part of it is what makes
Japan the way it is.
true, true.
Definitely. Like
like all the rules and bureaucracy
and like that trickles down into daily
life and how, in my opinion,
how people operate in Japan.
And follow the rules and are respectful
and put other people above themselves.
the I think the simplest explanation
people always make for Western culture
versus Japan is Western culture is life,
liberty, pursuit of happiness,
like for yourself,
where Japan is like
Mm.
for the greater good of the country.
Like that's kind of how people operate.
And I feel like part of that maybe that's
too much of a leap,
but it feels like the rules
and the bureaucracy are part of that.
I think it even comes down
Yeah.
to religion in some ways,
just Western religions versus eastern
religion, Buddhism and stuff like that.
I don't know. What do you think,
V? does does that seem to come
out in the Japanese culture a lot?
I would say so.
It feels that way.
I just don't like that the bureaucracy
has gotten s gotten to the point where
literally a saying in Japan,
like a common saying,
is the nail that sticks out,
it's the one that gets hammered.
And it feels
Mm.
like people, even who have like successful
businesses that want to grow,
like purposefully stay small so that they
don't, you know,
like make a commotion or cause
the government to like look more closely
at them. Like
I don't like that it does
Mm.
sometimes feel like there's a rule by fear
going on. Mm-hmm.
And I don't know,
I just think that kind of sucks.
Yeah, yeah, I agree.
Yeah, their their economy could probably
be doing a lot better.
Definitely.
I do always wonder why it stays the same.
Because I a lot of the Japanese people
I've spoken to
they disagree with this this whole thing
as well. Like they think that it could
be better, but nothing
Mm-hmm.
seems to change and I think no one wants
to change it because they don't want
to be the one that sticks out and like
take the first
Mm-hmm.
step.
Totally. Yeah.
It could it could also be like this
is just like my get a complete guess.
But do a lot of the people you talk to,
are they younger generally?
No, it's a mixture.
A mixture.
Yeah, yeah.
'cause Japan's
voting block is so interesting.
It's like we were talking about this
yesterday in France,
because we're in France and there's
similar
Mm.
less to a less degree,
like you know, a top heavy population.
So all the old people have more voting
power. So things that benefit old people
are the ones that stay in like the those
type of policies are the ones that
continue. And in
Mm.
Japan, I'm sure it's the same thing.
Like Japan's
population is so top heavy that the older
people are the ones who are like setting
policy 'cause they're voting
for it and maybe they like it that
way because it's how they're used to.
I don't know. That's just a complete
Yeah, yeah.
guess. That happens
in the US. Happens in the US too for sure.
Yeah.
I think that is probably part
But the US is
of it.
Yeah, the US, for all the problems,
best place to start a business and make
money. It's hard to be better than America
at at that mile.
Even being here,
That's true, that's true.
we've talked talked
to some people,
like a kid from Belgium that's starting
a similar kind of business.
Yeah. And they're he like can't
do anything without you can't even work
freelance without having like some sort
of license or like registering.
So
Mm.
that
automatically makes it harder to start
a business. His taxes are minimum fifty
percent. I think.
So he's like looking into all these other
ways to start a business outside
of the country,
which one is bad for the country because
they're not gonna get any of the money
from his business that he's starting from
Yeah, benefit. Yeah.
that country. And yeah,
I don't know, like I guess there's
definitely a balance.
we grew up in a place where the balance
was
There was no balance.
It was more capitalistic.
Yes. Make as much money at all costs.
Yeah.
That's a that's America.
Basically.
I feel like there's pros and cons with
It that's definitely the
that as well.
Definitely. For sure.
Yeah. There's a lot of cons.
And it's interesting getting to do this
job and be in Japan and learn so much
about Japan. And you constantly,
naturally, just compare the
two and you feel like wow,
you can make a country that
has all the positives of both and it would
be an awesome place.
You know? Obviously that's impossible
Yeah.
to do,
but just fun to think about stuff like
that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
We could have a whole episode about that.
the pros and cons of what would
be the perfect country mix between Japan
and and the US,
'cause they could both learn a lot from
that would be fun.
each other. You know.
Yeah, yeah.
And the UK
too. I don't know a n a ton about the UK,
but you could I'm sure you do.
Yeah, we could definitely add the
UK in as well.
Mm.
Kidding.
The red coats, yeah.
The red coats.
the last hot take.
This one's a funny one.
I don't know if you guys have ever done
it though. Take number twelve.
Solo karaoke is the best kind of karaoke.
Three, two,
one.
I've never done that,
but I would say you mean
Uh
solo like you're the only
one in the you're the only
one in the booth?
Like you're the
only one in the room,
yeah.
yeah, that's a horror.
That's insane. That's crazy.
People do that?
No way.
Yes.
you're singing by yourself?
To no one.
Yes, I would do that.
I guess it is probably fun.
But the whole fun is laughing at each
other. Yeah, it seems like you just take
yourself a little serious
True.
That's true. it's fun,
but then at the same time,
when you're solo,
you can literally just go insane
and not care what how you're singing.
You could do in front of other.
I think that's the point of what you're
supposed when
It's
you're with other Like you ain't Mariah
I I kinda care
Carey.
what I what I'm like when I'm singing,
I care.
Yeah, but that's like the best part about
doing it in Japan is they can't understand
you anyway when you're singing in English.
True, that's very true.
You know? Are you a big
Ha ha ha.
karaoke girl? Like are you going?
Is that your night out?
I used to go a lot,
but recently not so much.
But yeah, I feel like it is more it's
Yeah, I mean
more fun to do it as a group.
When a beer is half your calories
for the day, it's probably tough to wanna
go out.
That's why you stick to the hard liquor,
it's less calories.
Right. Right.
Gin.
I have a hot take for you guys.
So you guys got you guys
Gone.
have to answer.
Japanese people don't actually work hard.
Rated. I
Ooh.
mean I would say two.
rating it.
You
I think yeah, two.
Or not ho sorry,
not hard.
Yeah, I would
say two. I would say two.
Japanese people don't actually
work as hard as people think.
That's more of the statement.
Okay, yeah, yeah.
Two I would say two as well.
Yeah. So you kind of agree.
I'm a one. I'm a hard one on that.
Do you know what it is though?
I gave it a two because I feel like there
are
some that do work hard,
like genuinely do work
Yeah, of course.
hard, but I feel like a lot of the time
when they are working hard,
quote unquote, it's they're they're doing
things that make them look busy,
but they're not doing productive work,
Exactly.
if that makes sense.
Yeah. No, you're a hundred percent.
That's what I see all the time.
Yeah.
And there's very from what I've heard,
especially like in the construction
industry, there's like a top-down culture.
I mean, that's really in every industry
Mm.
in Japan. And if they're on a lunch break
and it's like two minutes left until they
have to go back to work,
they kind of all wait.
And if the head guy like lights another
cigarette,
Everybody lights another cigarette
Mmm Yeah.
and then they take another five minutes.
It's funny.
anyways, you guys,
thank you so much for joining
us on another episode of the Yuki Home
Presents podcast.
If you are listening to us,
please make sure to give us a like,
a comment, and subscribe and a five-star
rating. And we'll see you on the next
episode. Bye.