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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
riverside mp4
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[00:00:00] Bidet is way cleaner than just wiping your butt with toilet paper. Yeah, I mean, have you ever picked up dog poop and accidentally got some on your hand and
Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Yuki Homes Presents podcast. We're here with Nick. His head is growing by the day, but his brain is not. What? And Derek. He's on bean again, three cups today. Triple bean, baby. How you feeling? I'm feeling sprat. Anxious. All right. Hey, if you guys love the podcast, five-star reviews mean the world to us, and I know not everybody always listens all the way through, so we wanted to shout that out in the beginning.
Thank you, guys. Thanks. I love you. All right, Derek, tell us why are houses in Japan so much smaller than houses in the United States? I think they're smaller ... I don't have... This isn't, like, a proven fact, but I think they're smaller because of the minimum lot sizes. Japan doesn't have minimum lot sizes.
America has massive minimum lot [00:01:00] sizes. So the federal government caps what a municipality can set the maximum minimum to of 200 square meters, which is five times smaller than, like, the average US lot size. So you have a history of homes being subdivided and subdivided and subdivided into smaller and smaller lots, and which means smaller homes, and you get these densely packed neighborhoods.
Part of what makes Japan awesome. Yeah. What do you call that? The, the scrollable town? The scrollable town. Like the- The reels. The reels. Yeah, the towns like reels. They're- There's just something new on every corner. Yeah. It- Reels are more addictive though. That, that was kind of, like, mathematical though.
Let's, let's make it a little bit simpler. So let's just say the average lot size in America is 1,000 square feet if- No, it's tiny. No, it's- It's probably, like... It's probably, like, 10,000 square feet. In America? Yeah, lot size. Right, okay. Probably my, my area, yeah. Okay. So if the average lot size is 10,000 square feet- Like I said, his brain is not growing.
How big... What's the [00:02:00] average lot size in Japan? Like, a f- the average lot sizes in Japan is probably a f- One fifth ... the maximum minimum it could be. So the max, the biggest set it could be by the government is a fifth of that. The biggest it can be. Now, obviously... No, obviously it can be much bigger, but a local government can only cap it at that maximum of 200 square meters.
Does that make sense? So it is a local government's authority to cap the size of the lot, and the- Yes ... the lowest they could go... Or sorry, the- The biggest ... highest they could go is 2,000 square feet. Is a fifth. Exactly. A fifth of the size of, like, the average American lot size. Wow. Okay. So and if we're speaking in meters, that's, like, 700 meters about square.
Yeah. Wow. Something like that. I don't know. I don't know square meters, but yes, it's- It's, it's almost a third. Yeah. It's significantly smaller. So, you know, my house in the US is, like, 1,800 square feet, which is a standard house, definitely not big. In Japan, that would be a big house. Yeah, I [00:03:00] mean, how many bedrooms does your house have?
Five. Oh, okay. Yeah. It's actually kind of small for a five bedroom in the US. I'd say that's a pretty- Yeah ... a pretty decent sized house, though. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's a standard cape. Like, this is- Single family ... pretty much every house in My town Yeah. I mean, compare it to the five bedroom we bought in Japan.
How many square feet or meters was that? Our house in Japan's, like, 1,400. So my house is 400 square feet bigger. Okay. Or, like, 120, 130 meters. Square meters, yeah. I'm trying to, like, cater to everyone. Yeah. To our listeners out there. Tell me about the- I'll talk about my brain, Grant ... tell me about the little sinks.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, g- go for it. Grant was saying earlier before we started recording that he felt like Elf in our shower, splashing the water onto his body. But, but yeah. I mean, I almost just- The, the knees ... try not to shave when I'm in Japan because our sink is, like, six inches by four inches, and the only sink I've ever used that was that small was, like, on a packed sailboat.
So that is just not typical in the US at all. I don't know. I've, I've never even been to Australia, so I [00:04:00] wonder if it's similar there, but I have a feeling it's probably not. Yeah, it's tough. Using the tiny, tiny sink is really hard. Yeah. Our bathroom, if you're a big boy, like, your knees are hitting the door when you close it upstairs.
It's tiny. In the shower, you mean? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, even the toilet. I don't think you've ever even used our toilet up there. I've never used the toilet upstairs or the shower. I just kinda- Yeah, don't ... commandeer the bou- the down down. Yeah. It's not worth it up there. No. And we have the- One thing I noticed too, like, and, like, that I've noticed also, like, looking at a bunch of houses on Nippon Homes, like, the k- everybody's kitchen is so basic on all these houses.
Yeah. A lot of them are unit- Like, it doesn't- ... kitchens. That's probably why. Like, bigger manufacturing companies build out kitchen units, which you literally never see in the US, and they just kind of bring them in, install them. You get the width, height, length, whatever. And yeah, I mean, I bet you 30, 20, 30 years ago there weren't that big of a selection of kitchen units, so everyone was getting pretty similar stuff.[00:05:00]
If you wanna do- Mm-hmm ... like, a custom Western kitchen, it's gonna cost you more, probably more than it would in the US or Australia because it's so hard to get that material and find a contractor that has done something like that before. Gotcha. Yeah. I mean, when you look at listings all day, you see, like, if you're looking in the '80s, '70s, you see, like, five different kitchen units, five different bathroom units over and over and over again.
Mm-hmm. So that's pretty much what you're probably gonna get if you're buying a old house in Japan. I wonder if it was... Like, I wonder why that is. I wonder why the unit kitchen became a thing there. It sounds like if I was the manufacturer and you could normalize it, good business. Yeah, for sure. I- my guess would be post-Japan, post-World War II Japan was just building so much to keep up- Right
with a booming population. They probably standardized it, and that was the way to do it at a scale. Mm-hmm. And then it just kind of became Whoa. Look at that, guys. What's going on? Intruder? No, it's all good, dude. You can keep going. It doesn't matter. I got my two dogs right next to me. Yeah. I like a nice [00:06:00] dog bark in the pod.
They're just actually res- Sarah was saying that- They're just actually respectful ... we should put the dogs on the pod, so there we go. Yeah. Oh, they're on, dude. They're definitely on the pod. They're the main focus right now. I feel like I'd rather be in the video than on the audio, but that's just me.
Another thing to note about, you know, how tiny homes are is Nick's doing a renovation for one of our clients, and he raised, like, every doorway or something, right? Yeah, I mean, he's a pretty tall guy. I don't know exactly. I've never seen him in person, but he says he's 6'4", so he's probably 6'1" or 2'. No, I'm just playing.
But yeah, it's actually crazy. It's funny to see, like, him mixed with Hannah, mixed with local contractor, like, the ideas they come up with. And they tore out some of the walls between, say, the tatami room and the living room, and they raised... I don't even know what they would be called. Like, it's kind of just a, a separator, and it's, like, kinda like crown molding I guess, plus a little bit of extra.
You never see this in a home in the States really. But he raised everything by, like, seven and a half inches or I don't know how [00:07:00] many centimeters that would be. Like, 40 centimeters maybe. So now he doesn't have to duck when he goes between rooms, and then he... We replaced all the doorways with taller doors and did the same thing.
Pretty cool. So what, he had to get every single door custom made? I don't think they were custom. I think they were just taller doors, but I think he did get rid of more doors because it was more expensive to add the door than it was to just, like, blow out the room. So obviously there's still bedroom doors on bedrooms, but for, like, the living room to tatami, kitchen to living, they're just open floor plan, which is kinda nice.
Yeah, like modern builds have higher door frames, higher ceilings. Mm-hmm. But obviously most of our clients are buying older homes, so it wouldn't be custom, you know, 'cause they make those, they make those things now. But the older homes usually had low ceilings, low doorways. I think Nick even hit... You probably even hit your head on some of the doorways, right?
Or you're- I mean, I'm, I'm massive, so yeah, I hit my head on most things. I'm a little guy, so- No ... I squeeze right under them. I don't think I do. I think getting into our bathroom, downstairs bathroom, is probably the only [00:08:00] one 'cause that's, like, a unit and the door was- Oh, yeah, yeah. You step down into it, right?
Yeah, I do like squatting on the little hinoki stool though and, like, showering at the waist level. It's nice. I love that. I like that downstairs shower. It's, it's interesting. Yeah, stay out of it. That's mine. All right, I have, um, a question for you guys. So when you ... I know you guys added, like, what? Five mini splits to your house.
Like, what did that run, 20 grand to do that? Yeah. It was- I have the exact prices- Right ... if you want. I can pull it up if my internet decides to cooperate, but- I think it was 2.3 million yen, right? Yeah. I was gonna say in USD, but the problem and why it was so expensive, I mean, heat pumps, yeah, they're expensive.
They were about two grand each, but we also had to upgrade the electric, so that costed, like, almost $5,000 just to upgrade the electricity because the only heat in the house before we moved in was propane running on, like, a single unit. Or sorry, not propane, kerosene running on a single unit. So in all, we spent [00:09:00] 14,000 on the heat pumps, US, and then 5,000 on the electrical work.
Obviously five heat pumps is like we are making sure that we're comfortable, and they're both AC and heat. Mm-hmm. Honestly, looking back, I wish we would've kept, like, one kerosene heater. They just work better for, like, the bigger central living spaces, but I do like having the separate electric heat pumps for, for the bedrooms.
Okay, so- Yeah ... back, back- Grant, Grant's a little special and he cranked ours up to, uh, 40 Celsius- 98 degrees ... 'cause he thought it was, he thought it was Fahrenheit, so he cranked it to the highest temperature it would go, and we got an insane bill. He never told us, so we go in his room when he leaves- ... and it's literally the max temp you could set that heat pump to.
He was gone for, like, two days before I even realized it. That is not true. It's true. That is not true. That's 100% true. I definitely cranked it up- Lights are on ... but you guys knew about it ... heat's cranking. And why would 40 degrees- They have single pane windows ... Fahrenheit be the highest you could set it?
It was, like, 29 degrees Fahrenheit. They're single pane windows- And it was- ... but then they [00:10:00] have another slider- Yeah ... of glass. It's basically double pane. Yeah. It was- You just, you wanna just see the sun? Dude, don't, don't disrespect our house ... it was cold in the room. But- Oh, God ... my question off of that was do houses in Japan have any type of central AC or heating?
No. Like, I know that's, like, such a big, big deal. New builds in Tokyo do. Yeah. I mean, sometimes. Yeah. But these older houses, no, not at all. I mean, we've actually looked at quoting one, and it was just, like, insanely expensive. One of the cool, like, n- I mean, I think it's cool because it's actually, like, good for the environment and stuff like that, is floor heating.
So there are a couple houses, not super old- Mm-hmm ... but even built in, like, the 2000s that have... I forget the word for it, but it's basically- Radiant heating ... yeah, radiant heating at, in the floor, and that's, like- Mm ... one of the best ways to heat your house. Hot air rises, so it, like, keeps it all kind of centrally the same temperature.
And I don't know, it's just kinda cool to have nice warm feet. Yeah. Our house floor is freezing- Yeah ... so that would be super nice. I go from, like, rug to rug when I'm walking around. I mean, my house in the US doesn't [00:11:00] have central h- central air, and it would be, even here, way too expensive to do it. Nowadays with the split units, like, it doesn't make sense to do central.
Like, if I do upgrade my cooling and heating system in my house here, I would also do a split unit set-up, so I think that just makes the most sense economically these days. The splits are pretty good. The splits are good. I just... I have central AC and heating. I mean, it's great. I love it. Yeah, it's, it's for sure way better.
I mean, you're in Jersey too, though. I don't have heat- Yeah ... or AC, but I'm in San Diego, so I, I'm usually okay. I had to get a window unit for the summer, though. It was just too much. Yeah, you were dripping sweat that day. Yeah. I've had a couple, couple days like that. Big shout-out Costco. Window units crank.
I love, I loved a window unit when I had one. All right, get us back on the rails, Grant. Are, are we? All right. Talk to me about, like, the entranceways, like everybody has to take their shoes off. I remember that was a huge deal when I came. I- It was a huge d- it was a huge deal for only you. Yeah. Yeah. I, I [00:12:00] remember- Everyone else listened
never, never- Everyone listened immediately ... take my shoes- You could not get it, dude. Every time you stomped in the house, you would keep your shoes on. You know why? I think it's just this respect thing. Grant has zero- Yeah ... respect. Yeah, he doesn't have much. No discipline either. Can't tame this guy. No, it's called a- Dude, when we first- All right, get me back on the rails.
Hold on. When we first- It's called a genkan. Genkan, right? When we first landed in Japan, dude, Grant on the subway, Grant crossing streets, dude, he was untamable. He didn't care about the rules at all. Board shorts on. He was assaulting everyone with his leg hair. There was a lot of har- leg hair harassment- Hair harassment
going on from Grant. But yeah, it's called a genkan. Standard. They're awesome. I mean, I don't wear shoes in my house here, so- It's like a built-in mudroom ... I'm used to it. Yeah. They're awesome. And what do you wanna know, Grant? What else do you wanna know about it? You just still don't understand? What else? W- Does...
What's different about it than the US mudroom? I mean, m- most houses don't have a mudroom here, I feel like. Does yours? Yeah. Oh, okay. Your house has everything. I don't live in yours, dude. [00:13:00] Yeah, central air mudroom. House is sick. How rich are you, dude? Jeez, no, my house doesn't. I'm making it happen over here.
It's front porch, front door, straight to the carpet, so people be stomping around in their shoes all the time. I love- Yeah ... stomping around in any house that Nick owns, just saying. I don't own any house. Just... Well, I guess I do. I guess another- Not this one, though ... another thing that's interesting about houses sort of tied to the genkan that's really cool that you don't see in the US, and it's pretty standard in Japan, is that secondary genkan.
It's the exterior one that's like- Mm-hmm ... a glass room. Mm-hmm. So, like, you step in, and it's a glass box. You could leave your snowboard shit out there, and then you step in the actual genkan, and most homes in Otaru have it, which is pretty awesome. Mm-hmm. That might be my favorite part about our house. Yeah, it kinda feels like- Honestly
you're getting on a spaceship, and then they're, like, sucking all the oxygen out, and then you're out in space. Are there, are there any other unwritten rules that I should know for the next time I visit? Unwritten rules- No, you can't go in Nick's, you [00:14:00] can't go in Nick's shower. That's a rule. You can't go in Nick's shower.
You know what's a funny one? And I think you did this, was between the hours of, like, 8:00 and 10:00 AM when people are going to work, and I think maybe after as well, they have women-only subway cars. So that's, I think it's to keep men that are still out from the night before from, like, hitting on women that are just trying to go to work.
It's a g- it's from groping. Yeah. They had a groping problem. Yeah. I was trying to beat around that bush, but you went- Yeah, I- Nick said, "I think you did this." That's why you, that's why you wanted to get on those cars. No, I, I actually- This guy can't be tamed No. A few years ago when I was in Japan, or three years ago when I was in Japan with my girlfriend, we accidentally got on an all-women car, and I didn't realize it until, like, three stops later, so I was just blaming you.
You're, you're a good scapegoat. Yeah. Thanks. All right, let's talk about what everybody wants to know, the to- the toilets. [00:15:00] Why are they so much better in Japan? What is going on? I mean, I got one word for you: bidet. Bidet. Yeah. No, but, like- I guess they just- ... why is it so standard over there to have these great toilets?
It's like- That's a really good question. Like, why did it begin? I, you know- I don't know. If you guys ever watch the show Shogun on FX, have you guys ever seen that show? It's really good. I've seen it. I've seen two episodes. I've seen clips. Yeah, so one of the interesting things from that sh- I'm just too busy.
I actually have work to do, you know? Yeah. No, I get that. I haven't watched anything in months. This was years ago. But on the show, something that was interesting that I learned was that, like, when American, or not Americans, Europeans came to Japan in the 1800s, they were, like, looked at as really dirty people, and Japan has a long history of cleanliness and bathing more frequently and staying clean, where I guess when Europeans came, they stunk and, like, didn't wanna shower.
So who knows? Maybe it comes from a long history of wanting to stay clean, and what... Bidet is way cleaner than just wiping your butt with toilet paper. Yeah, I mean, have you ever picked up dog poop and accidentally got some on your hand and just used dry [00:16:00] paper towel to wipe it off? Yeah, it'd be insane. So, you know, why do that with your booty, you know?
Yeah. No, it just baffles me- So that's my theory ... that, like, even every single public bathroom is, like, so clean- Just the best ... has a great toilet. Like, you're, it's, it's insane. So nice. Yeah. Yeah. Honestly, I'm not sure. That's a good little history lesson we should dive into. Yeah. You should've had that prepared if you're gonna ask that kinda question, you know?
I'll dive into it, Grant. I'll get back to you. I asked, I asked the question. Check the s- check the Substack later. We'll, we'll dive. Um, all right, let's dive into neighbors. We're diving a lot today. Yeah. Yes. Tell me about, like, introduction to neighbors. I know we covered it before, but, like, what's, what's different?
Like, let's say you move into a house in Japan versus moving into a house in America, what are you gonna do differently with your neighbors? Yeah, I mean, I'd like to think that I went and introduced myself to my neighbors. I typically do, honestly, when I'm around here or I just meet them, you know, on the street.
I guess it's easier because they also speak [00:17:00] English and that's my native language. But in Japan, a neighborhood I think they take very seriously and, and one of their huge biggest concerns is foreigners moving in. You know, there's towns that we just today had a guy that was trying to make an offer on a home, and if it wasn't gonna be a permanent resident the seller didn't wanna sell it.
So I think it's just one of those things that's a big concern, and making sure that you introduce yourself, you make sure they know that you're respectful. You can give them small gifts, nothing crazy obviously. It's actually, you know, works the opposite way if you, if you go over the top and give them too good of a gift.
So there's, there's like a happy medium and honestly I think if you just generally are respectful and conscious, not like you were when you showed up at our house, people- ... people are pretty, pretty well, pretty, it's pretty well received. We should, we should write like a PDF and it could, it should be called Don't Act Like Grant in Japan.
And that's, and that's how everyone will like you. Un-Grantify yourself. Only possible for some. But I mean, [00:18:00] yeah, what else? Ask, ask another question. Let's, let's, let's talk about, uh, earthquake rules and stuff, 'cause that's a really common thing people worry about. Well, before we dive into earthquakes, tell me about- Okay
tatami rooms. I wanna know why that's, like, literally standard in every single Japanese home. So the reason I understand that there's tatami rooms and why they were standard is because they're flexible rooms. So homes are generally smaller, so when you have a tatami room and you have a futon, you wake up, you roll your futon up, you put it in the closet and now your tatami room can also be your TV room or your room where you eat or play games when you have guests over.
So it's just a f- it's just a versatile room that you could make anything. So that I think was the original reason they were standard. I think they're becoming less and less standard- Yeah ... from my understanding in modern builds. We put one in 'cause it's cool. It's nice, like when you're renting to foreigners, give them a little more of a Japanese experience, and the room smells awesome.
Like, I do like that tatami smell. Mm-hmm. Yeah, we got the [00:19:00] real tatami, right? It's not- Yeah ... the- We went with real ... manufactured stuff. Yeah. So- Yeah, they do synthetic now. Right, which stays longer, is way less resistant to mold. So if you are gonna use your home like a vacation home and not have anyone in there for like three to five months at a time, I would say we're gonna recommend synthetic because you don't wanna have- Yeah
the heat and the climate all perfect just so that mold doesn't grow and that's a, it's pretty expensive just to have some real tatami. Yeah, for sure. Um- I mean, it's like a natural material, so it's just absorbing moisture- Right ... all the time. And then the prayer room. What about the little prayer... It's almost like a closet.
Yeah, I mean, we wanted to turn ours into, like, a office space, but we were told, "Don't do that. It could be disrespectful." Then we've heard from other people it's not really disrespectful because it's not your prayer room. You're not putting some of your family's- Mm-hmm ... artifacts there. So I don't know. It depends on who you speak to, if you speak to an old-school guy or a younger Japanese person.
But I wish we kinda just tore ours out and [00:20:00] made it useful, 'cause we just hung our, uh, our Dyson in there. Seems wor- seems worse than making it- Yeah ... a workspace. I think you're probably right. I mean, it's still there if somebody wanted to pray to something. It's, it, it exists. Yeah. Dyson, Dyson's a pretty good brand.
I mean- Yeah ... I could hit them with a prayer too. They're worth a prayer. I just got a V10. Yeah, I got the one that- Talk about rich ... has the little green light. Shout out Dyson. Does yours have the green light? I have no idea. I haven't even opened it. Mine has a green light. It's sick. Spoiler alert, I haven't taken it out of the box yet.
Over here, the batteries goes. Yeah, their batteries die. You can get new batteries super cheap on Amazon, like 30 bucks. You vacuum, Grant? You don't strike me as much of a vacuumer. Two dogs, dude. He watches Sarah vacuum. Yeah, I was gonna say- 10 points ... Sarah's doing the vacuuming. I lift my feet off the ottoman.
Yeah, with sh- She goes- With your shoes on ... and you, you shake your head doing it 'cause you're pissed. All right, what else? What else we got? All right, let's dive into earthquakes. Tell me about it. Dive, dive, dive, dive, dive, Graham. Why are we diving with them? Can [00:21:00] we g- Can we use a different adjective? It's a verb, dude.
A verb, sorry. Yeah, that's true. Verb, it's what you do. I take it back. Remember that? Derek's, Derek's brain is not- You guys remember that commercial when we were kids? No. Which one? It was like, "Verb, it's what you do." It was, like, a guy doing action sports. Was it, like, a Nike commercial? I was, I was just gonna ask the same.
It might have been. But yeah, earthquake rules. So 1981 was when they made a federal law that set standards across the board. So a lot of people use that date as, like, a buy anything '81 or newer, and I won't even touch anything '81 or older. But I think that's pretty shortsighted in a lot of places. Like, where we own our house, I did compare the Japan earthquake charts to the American earthquake charts and had Claude tell me if New York or Otaru was more likely to experience a disastrous earthquake, and they were about the same.
And no one in New York worries about earthquakes. So it's not a uniform risk of earthquakes across Japan, so depending on where you buy, that, [00:22:00] that's where I would bring 1981 into it. A place like Otaru, I personally don't think you need to worry about it. A place like Izu or the Pacific side of Japan, Fukushima, definitely worry about '81 and go for an '81 or newer.
So that's my take on it. Yeah. I mean, we could dive into insurance, but I feel like we've talked about that before. Basically, you buy fire insurance. You do have to make sure you add the earthquake insurance if you want, if you're worried about earthquakes. And it's, it's seriously, like, 50/50 with our clients.
Like, some people are very, very worried about it. We've even had clients decide after that earthquake in, uh... Where was that, like, most recent earthquake? It wasn't in Japan. It was in Venezuela. Yeah, in Venezuela. They kind of had, like, PTSD from they did experience an earthquake in, like, Hiroshima or something.
She was in Japan, living in Japan as a teacher during the Kobe earthquake, which is the most- Kobe earthquake ... deadly- Right. Right ... in history. Yeah, and she had a kid. And she almost died. So yeah, that ended up- Understandably. Yeah. So- It's pretty wild. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of up, up to the individual. We [00:23:00] try not to throw our opinions in there too much because really it is, like, your- Personal
personal level of ... Yeah. And a lot of people ask, like, is it worth upgrading your house to the new standards if it is pre-'81? And there are some municipalities that give subsidies to do that. In that case, I would say it's probably worth it, but I think it is pretty expensive to, to do the upgrade without the subsidies.
Yeah. I mean, a lot of it's foundational, too. And they actually say... One of our contractors I was talking to, he said probably 50% of homes built before 1981 are built to the 1981 legal standards. So it's a, there's a chance that your house would be, like our house might be. We don't, really don't know, and there's no way to actually prove that.
But you know, it could just be hearsay, but that's what I heard, and I'm just gonna hope that our house is safe, really. No, I did... I was writing a article today that- You hit that prayer route. Yeah, I hit it. I, uh, I was writing an article today that supported exactly what you just said. It was, it was interesting.
We could talk about it. It was more [00:24:00] about, like, a common misconception that everyone on Instagram parrots that Japan houses are disposable. Like, a home is- Mm-hmm ... meant to be tore down after 30 years, and I just wrote an article about why that's not true. And, and the basic answer is that pre-'80... Not pre-'81.
Post-World War II, Japan was building a ton of homes, and the land was exploding in value. So when banks were assessing the value, they were focusing on the land. They never really developed a good system to go out and appraise values of homes like in the US where your bank goes out and appraises your home, and it compares it to local recent sales.
Japan never developed a good system for that for the house. So they would just assess the house at zero, and it created this reinforcing loop where nobody would keep records on their house. No one would keep permits or maintenance. So the bank then had a harder time to assess the house, and then '81 came along, and then they're like, "Oh, this is a perfect imaginary line where it's like anything pre-'81, we can just assume is not a safe house," even though that is wrong often, like you said, [00:25:00] 50% of the time, some estimates.
So they just developed this reinforcing system of assessing homes that made homes assess towards zero. But that has nothing to do with the actual structure or safety of your house. It's just the way they assess homes. So when people tell you that online that homes are meant to be disposable in Japan, that is absolutely not true.
Yeah, that's a really good... I'm just kidding. Yeah, that's a really good point. What else you wanna talk about, Grant? Let's dive in. I mean, you have that whole doc, dude. That is sick. I mean, is there anything else, um, Nick, that you could think of? Like, I guess, is there a lot of exterior maintenance? Do a lot of these homes have lawns and shu- like, things like that that- Yeah
you have to maintain your, in the summer? I mean, I can tell- Oh, yeah, I got, I got a good one Okay. All right. All right, go Grant. Dive in, baby. Do people in Japan care about their landscaping as much as people in the United States? I know Derek's a huge, huge planter. He loves, he loves his strawberries and his zucchinis, and [00:26:00] likes- He loves having- He loves carrots
you know, organic, organic fresh fruits. He likes carrot juice. Cucumbers. He juices his own carrots. I, I love those. Plant. I love the extra small cucumbers, actually. Yeah, make pickles with them? Yeah. Nice, dude. Do a couple other things with them too. And I, I thi- I mean, I know people love to go out and mow their lawns.
That's a thing. Like, what is it- I mean, who likes mowing their lawn, dude? It sucks. Nah, that's for suckers. People enjoy it. That's an American dream thing that suckers listen to. It sucks. But, uh- I usually get Cory up here to mow my lawn. Yeah. No, I mean, I would say in like, in areas like Tokyo, many people don't have the land or space to garden at all, so it's almost a non-issue.
There's obviously a ton of land in Otaru, and yeah, there's a lot of hardscape gardens. There's not really a ton of like, plants that you can grow. I actually read an article, and I think I've said it on a previous podcast, but a dude in Hokkaido grew, like, a banana farm for the first time in maybe ever. Um, but he used a greenhouse and it was very extreme.
But there's so much snow [00:27:00] that not a whole lot can grow. So even for, like, our clients that wanna have a nice front lawn garden, I guess you could call it, we're typically doing, like, red stone brick and stuff like that just to make it look good, but you're not gonna have living plants or flowers very often.
Maybe in the summer. And then in the summer, grass grows like crazy. I actually woke up with ants all over me one morning because we had, like, a plant growing into my window and, I don't know, I just didn't really think about it, and then there were ants that, like, crawled up. We actually ... I think, I think- I think they, they enter, we entered- He slept in- Yeah, I was- He slept in your bed, Grant.
Dude, I woke up- That was so funny ... covered in ants. I saw the... I s- you sent a picture or something and I was like- Yeah ... "What's going on?" Yeah. I know. It was bad. I mean, we have, like, a giant... We actually have a big lot, and we have, I don't even know- Snakes live in there ... what those plants are Yeah, it's just like- Yeah, we got snakes
it looks like prehistoric grass. Like, it's very- Yeah ... strong grass. It's crazy. And yeah, so we get- we have a weed whacker go out to our house and a lot of our clients' properties. We make [00:28:00] sure that gets all trimmed up. But yeah, I mean, once a month at least, and it's definitely, like, a two-hour job. It's not simple.
Yeah. So yeah, I mean, if you've never been to Hokkaido in the summer, it's super green, super wet. Like, it's very alive. There's spiders. A l- a lot of spiders. Yeah, I mean, I- Really selling it ... I think if, if you're bu- Snakes, spiders. No, I mean, it's awesome. Bears. But, like, we went on a hike, and there weren't- Lots of bears
there was, like, no other people on this hike, and I probably walked through five spiderwebs. Not that that's weird, but- Yeah, I had Nick lead the way like a sucker. Yeah. Derek was in jeans, so who's the real sucker? Those huge jeans. We got a- we did that hike, and then we told someone about it, and they pulled up a bear tracker, and he was like, "That's where you guys were?"
And Paul showed us his phone and the map, and there was a bear sighting the day before on the exact route we were at. It's kinda scary. And there's grizzlies up there, so they're big bears. Yeah. Grizzlies are bears. I think black bears are more dangerous though, right? Grizzlies- They kill for sport. Yeah, exactly.
Grizzlies, unless they're [00:29:00] hungry. What do they say? Brown get down, black fight back? Never heard that. Something like that. Sounds racist. You never... It's not. It's a- ... it's a bear saying- Jeez ... to save your life. So you heard it here. I- In case you ever encounter a bear. And, like, I think bear spray is illegal, right?
People do say to wear- You can get it ... people do say to wear bells, but I think that's a myth. It's bullshit, dude. Yeah. It's a friggin' dinner bell. Yeah, yeah. You're letting the bears know you're ready to get eaten. All right. But I was gonna say, if you- You wanna wrap this thing up at some point? No, s- yeah, one, one quick thing.
If you are buying a house in Japan, I think a lot of people think zen gardens and all that stuff. Buy a house with no garden. It's not worth it. You're not gonna be there all the time. Having to pay someone every month to whack down that prehistoric grass is just... is worthless to us. Yeah. I would rather it not be there.
Yeah. I mean, unless you're gonna live there, want to get residency- Yeah ... or be there for six months, then I think it's totally worth it. For sure. I mean, we actually... I guess we're not closed, but one of our clients from France, actually, that wants to live in Japan, he's getting residency and [00:30:00] all that, uh, we finally got an offer accepted for him in Joetsu, right?
So that's cool. That was, like, a nine or 10-month journey. We've been, we've been looking for a while. I don't know, shout out. But yeah, I think, I think we touched everything, right? Well- Let's dive right out of here ... I was confused on where you were going with the client. Oh, I was just saying... I don't know. Why did I say?
Oh, because he's gonna live there, so he does- Because he's... Yeah ... have a little bit of a garden and stuff like that. Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. Yeah. I guess I didn't say anything about the garden, but yeah. I forget what he said. It was cool. All right. Sign us off, Derek. Thanks for listening, guys. Remember, five stars.
Means a lot and, yeah, we'll see you next week. Cheers.