Tag - housing

 
 

HOUSING

Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS
Apr 1, 2018
New minpaku law will alter Japan's rental and hospitality landscape
A new law will go into effect in June to regulate minpaku, private residences rented out by their owners as short-term lodgings. To most, the new law will address changes that have occurred in recent years due to the rise of Airbnb, the worldwide online service that allows travelers to book rooms in...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Mar 12, 2018
London house prices drop at the fastest pace since 2009
London house prices are falling at the fastest pace since the depths of the recession almost a decade ago, with the capital's most expensive areas seeing the biggest declines.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS
Mar 4, 2018
Doling out some truths about Japan's 'share houses'
Many Japanese people are wary of investment as a means of growing their savings. There are a variety of reasons for this caution, so most keep their money in a bank, gaining almost no interest in the process, in the hope that they won't lose any in the long run. However, some salaried workers who understand...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS
Feb 11, 2018
Condo management is in need of repairs
On Dec. 18, the Supreme Court's petit bench ruled against a man from Fukuoka Prefecture who was suing the management association (kanri kumiai) of his condominium for firing him as its president of the board (rijicho) because the regulations of the association contained no stipulations for dismissal....
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS
Dec 31, 2017
Lessons about Japan's school catchment areas
A neighbor recently asked us to sign a petition requesting that the local education committee keep a certain elementary school open. Due to falling enrollment, students who attended the school would be transferred to a different one in the near future.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Dec 23, 2017
Fuji TV's home-improvement wrecking ball
A popular sub-genre of reality TV is the home-improvement show, and as with many things having to do with television, Japan did it first.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS
Dec 3, 2017
Can a death kill property value?
The apartment in Zama, Kanagawa Prefecture, where police found the remains of nine bodies in late October is one of 12 units in a two-story wooden apartment building located 10 minutes from Sobudai Station on the Odakyu Odawara line. Each unit consists of one room and a kitchen and, according to various...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS
Nov 5, 2017
A gut feeling that you need an extra toilet
Everybody knows that Japan produces the most technologically advanced toilets in the world. They pretty much do everything except pull up your pants when you're finished. And one of the more pleasant surprises greeting foreign visitors to Japan is the ubiquity and accessibility of public toilets.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Nov 5, 2017
Know the fees you may have to pay when you leave rented digs in Japan
A reader asks about a payment demand from the manager of an apartment in Tokyo that the reader vacated in a hurry.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS
Oct 1, 2017
Re-registering property: The lie of the land
According to an article that appeared in the Asahi Shimbun last June, authorities are unsure of the title holders to 4.1 million hectares of land in Japan — in total, an area equivalent in size to the island of Kyushu. Though this problem has been evident at least since the 1980s, the government didn't...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Sep 28, 2017
Lawyerless Turk challenges Osaka car dealer's snub of non-Japanese patrons, wins redress
In a highly unusual case that has surprised Japanese legal experts, a Turkish national based in Osaka sued a local second-hand car dealer for discrimination and won, all without the services of a lawyer.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / FOREIGN AGENDA
Sep 25, 2017
Buying a house in Japan can be an investment in joy
The 'return' on your investment in a home in Japan is best measured in terms of the pleasure it will yield and the doorway to the intimacies of community and the Japanese mind it will lure you into.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / HOTLINE TO NAGATACHO
Sep 20, 2017
With every new construction in Japan, fewer trees
When houses are demolished, there is a very bad habit here of cutting down all the trees on the plot, leaving the ground cleared and empty for new construction.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS
Sep 3, 2017
The hot topic of high-rise fire prevention
The fire that killed at least 80 people in London's Grenfell Tower in June, as well as similar apartment building blazes that recently occured in Dubai and Hawaii, has brought the world's attention to the issue of safety in high-rise residences.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS
Aug 6, 2017
Reviving Japan's old shopping arcades
As everyone knows, Japan has an unmanageable surplus of vacant housing. According to the latest government surveys there are more than 8 million unoccupied houses and apartment units in Japan and that number will increase to the point where one in four or five residences will be empty by 2030.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jul 31, 2017
The bust never ended for Wall Street's most crisis-scarred banks
Ten years ago today a pair of Bear Stearns Cos. hedge funds that had gorged on subprime mortgage securities filed for bankruptcy, becoming the canaries in the coal mine for the global financial system that collapsed 15 months later.

Longform

Professional cleaner Hirofumi Sakurai takes a moment to appreciate some photographs in a Gotanda apartment whose occupant died alone.
The last cleanup: Life and death in a lonely Japan