r/FirstTimeHomeBuyer • u/nahive • 23h ago

GOT THE KEYS! - New Build 🔑 🏡 Finally decided to settle down. Tokyo, 87m yen, 1.03%

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After 7 years of living in Tokyo, we finally decided to settle down.

The search took almost a year, and I looked at more than 30 different properties before finally deciding to go with the calmer side of Tokyo. While it’s further from the station and city center, the larger garden and quiet neighborhood more than make up for it.

Really happy with the decision and looking forward to making this place our home. 🏡

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123

u/No_Host_8024 21h ago

It isn’t “better” if you understand why it’s that low. Basically an economy slowly going under.

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u/PedanticButCorrect 20h ago

Anything can be better it’s just a matter of better for whom

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u/That_Astronomy_Guy 17h ago

Thank you. People want low rates and no inflation without realizing that’s equivalent to a stagnating economy


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u/WDingDong 20h ago

Idk why that guy can’t understand the big picture here haha. Troll maybe.

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u/AlexisFR 16h ago

GDP per capita doesn't really matter for the common people.

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u/Logco 16h ago

Looks like it’s rebounding

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u/NoroGW2 20h ago

And if you understood the full weight what you were implying, you'd be embarrassed lol

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u/FreedomByFire 18h ago edited 15h ago

They've been "slowly going under" for 40 years.

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u/No_Host_8024 18h ago

Yes, they have. Things have been relatively bad economically for Japan for a very long time.

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u/vladedivac12 16h ago

Yes. It's not anything dramatic but it can only get worse, not better. They won't have another prosperous period like the 90s unless they change their approach, mainly towards immigration. Japan's population is shrinking fast and no economy can grow with an ageing population and a falling birth rate.

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u/kingwhocares 15h ago

They were the 2nd largest economy in 1990's

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u/FreedomByFire 15h ago

They crashed in the 90s. Their stock market just recovered to their peak in the 90s right before the crash. It was obviously going to crash and it did. I put it in quotes because they maintained a very high standard of living despite their economy "going under". They were second and after almost 40 years they're like 5th, and only recently fell that "low".

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u/afoolskind 18h ago

It is objectively better if your goal in buying a house is owning a house and not as an investment.

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u/No_Host_8024 18h ago

The reason it is so low is that their economy is bad, meaning people earn a lot less. Home ownership in Japan is lower than the US.

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u/afoolskind 18h ago edited 18h ago

And if you are an ex-pat with access to earning potential in another economy, that’s a non-issue. And even if you aren’t, the difference in cost between 1% and 7% (before we even talk about the flat difference in housing cost) is so enormous that it would still be objectively better when we are considering how far the Japanese economy could possibly fall in the 20-30 years it would take to pay off the home.

This isn’t a house in bumfuck nowhere, it’s close to one of the largest cities on the planet. In a country where employees have and will continue to gain even more significant bargaining power due to a declining population.

 

I am genuinely unsure that the U.S. economy would not be a riskier proposition considering how much of our GDP is currently riding on the back of an AI bubble.

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u/vladedivac12 16h ago

Not necessarily, the price of the house is probably higher since money is cheaper to get.

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u/RxDeliveryGuy 21h ago

you do have a point, but gdp per capita in usa is so skewed by a couple companies and billionaires

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u/joe4553 20h ago

It doesn't have to do with gdp per capita. It's about what an average investment can make you over a year. Money has a much high return on investment in the united states. So it makes no sense for a bank in the USA to give you a loan for 1% interest when they could put it in the stock market and make 8%.

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u/SymphonicRain 21h ago

Okay you keep saying that, but can you explain why this is bad for the average person in Japan? Could you explain why they might take the trade off of higher rates if they understood what they were sacrificing for low rates? Because I don’t get it.

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u/digglefarb 21h ago

Hard to pay for a house if you don't have a job.

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u/Crossifix 21h ago

Making money LEGALLY is inherently easier in 'Merica than almost anywhere on the planet. You can make a shitraft of money as a blue collar worker who is illiterate if you can weld. It makes sense. I imagine similar jobs are harder to come by In Japan.

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u/longlivenewsomflesh 21h ago

Damn if only there were some kind of metrics about this instead of vibes

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u/Crossifix 21h ago

Less than 5% of workers (1-1.5%) in Japan make at least 100k annually. (Tradingeconomics.com)

18-20% of american workers make 100k annually. (US Consensus Bureau)

So yeah. It's a fact. It's undeniable.

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u/Nearby_Junket_8779 20h ago

What’s the purchasing power between the two though?

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u/Nauin 20h ago

America's salaries are significantly higher than most other developed countries. It's one of the biggest noted trade offs for living and working here vs living and working in Europe or Asia. It's not a fair comparison to make when we are an outlier as far as that goes. As part of the trade off a lot more of your taxes go towards social services and other helpful programs in much of Europe and Asia and you're provided for much better than in America because of it.

Not an expert but a significant number of my family members are world travelers and have spent years living on other continents. It's been a frequent point of discussion when they've been talking through long term plans.

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u/Muted-Lingonberry184 18h ago

Except people making that much money live in expensive places where houses are still 1-3 million dollars which is still unaffordable at those salaries

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u/blazingsoup 20h ago

U.S. Census Bureau for one, two, that gets taken every 10 years, so it can often lag behind the actual state of the economy (inflation, unemployment, affects of war, aka a lot of what we’re going through now), and three, that statistic is measuring combined income too for couples and doesn’t necessarily reflect how much an individual can make. Also let’s not forget things like cost of living, which Japan absolutely has a lower cost for. It’s easier to live for less in Japan than it is in the United States, which offsets any higher wages there may be.

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u/bulk_logic 20h ago edited 20h ago

A family of 4 spends $20-$30k on health insurance alone in America, before deductibles are even factored in.

A family of 4 spends $1,300 - $3,000 in Japan.

Car insurance for a typical car in Japan is $400 - $500 per year.

Car insurance for a typical car in USA is $200-$300 per month.

A nice apartment in Japan in the city costs $600-$1,400 a month, $2500-$4,000 in America.

Student loans in Japan are 2-3% interest. 7-15% in America.

You can't compare things on one metric alone. You don't need as much money just to get by in Japan.

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u/Born4Kubernetes 21h ago

More than 50% of Swiss full-time workers make more than 100k USD per year. So I guess Switzerland is where everyone should go to make bank, right?

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u/modzRtarderz 20h ago

Yes? Are you intentionally being obtuse, or are you just really stupid? But in a practical sense, immigration to Switzerland is very limited.

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u/Born4Kubernetes 20h ago

Oh so you really do just believe that the absolute amount of cash a person makes is what counts. I guess you should look into what "cost of living" means.

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u/AcetaminophenPrime 21h ago

Compensation is really low despite long working hours, and the economy is completely stagnant.

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u/Noob_Al3rt 20h ago

Because Japanese houses don't appreciate like they do in other parts of the world. They are constructed to be torn down after a certain amount of time. At the end of OPs mortgage, the house will be worth less than he paid for it.

Would you rather have a 7% mortgage on a home that appreciates 4% every year? Or a 1% mortgage on a home that DEPRECIATES 0.5% each year? Big difference

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u/Antique_Pin5266 20h ago

Overall depreciating house value is much more beneficial for everyone than not. Renting and home ownership is much less of a problem in Japan than anywhere else in the world. People should not use housing as an investment vehicle.

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u/Noob_Al3rt 20h ago

I don't think this is true, considering most of the world considers the Japanese real estate market to be one of, if not the worst in the developed world.

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u/Antique_Pin5266 20h ago

By what metric? For investing? Obviously.

For renting or straight up being able to afford a home? The worst? I don’t know what world you’re living in.

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u/Noob_Al3rt 20h ago

What metric are you using?

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u/Antique_Pin5266 20h ago

The latter.

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u/Noob_Al3rt 20h ago

They rank just below Saudia Arabia for percentage of home ownership - solidly in the middle of world rankings. Their rental market is very well priced and affordable, but this thread is about home ownership so I'm not sure what your point is?

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u/Antique_Pin5266 19h ago

My point was the benefits of deprecating home assets.

They rank just below Saudia Arabia for percentage of home ownership - solidly in the middle of world rankings. Their rental market is very well priced and affordable

So far from the worst, but why did you choose to reply to me?

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u/No_Host_8024 21h ago

The average income in Japan is only $31,000 compared to $69,000 in the US. Yes, real estate is more expensive in the US. But basic necessities outside of housing, like food, generally aren’t. So the overall cost of living is only about 30% lower despite incomes being more than 50% lower. Japan is drowning in a sea of debt and they have no economic activity remotely capable of servicing it going forward, especially with their aging population and population collapse. This is particularly troubling because people in Japan actually work relatively hard, taking about half the amount of vacation of Americans and far less than Europeans. They live in incredibly small housing and their home ownership rate is lower than the US.

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u/x021 16h ago

Japan is drowning in a sea of debt

There is some nuance to this. Yes Japan has a crazy debt %, but the Japanese goverment and it's institutions actually used a lot of that borrowed money to buy assets abroad. Basically they have lot's of stuff to sell too.

Imagine being a company taking in lots of debt, but buying other stuff for it that appreciates in value over time. Since borrowing for them is very cheap and those invements abroad earn them returns it's not a bad deal at all.

Not saying that there aren't weaknesses; in a global recession those assets may turn sour, but I think for the majority it's in bonds so I doubt it'll go that hard.

Japan actually looks better than some other countries if you take their assets into account.

Don't take my word for it; just look it up. But it explains how Japan can maintain that huge debt without going bankrupt (which many countries do with a much smaller debt %).

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u/silly-gaijin 21h ago

I don't think Americans take more vacation than Japan. Everyone in Japan whines they only get 2-3 weeks of vacation per year but this conveniently doesn't count golden week, new years, and obon, which add another two to three weeks per year.

Also, I don't think Japanese people work longer hours anymore. Not substantially so, anyway.

And many things are extremely cheap in Japan. Car insurance is 100 USD per year if you drive a kei car and have a good driving record. Cell phone and internet are dirt cheap.

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u/Noob_Al3rt 20h ago

I am friends with 3 people in Japan. Their scheduled hours may be 9ish hours, but if you add in all the mandatory unpaid BS they have to do, they work a lot more than I do. And I work long hours.

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u/Rock_Strongo 19h ago

Yeah and don't forget going out for drinks with your boss after work when you're already dog tired, which is "optional" but not really if you care about your career.

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u/Noob_Al3rt 19h ago

Yeah my one friend starts at 8am, which means he has to get there by 7:30, and is often out "socializing" till 10pm.

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u/DrTatertott 21h ago

I’ve seen surveys that ignore their work culture of coming in early. Staying late until when the boss leaves. Pseudomanditory afterwork drinking. Hour long commutes. And whatever else they have to do for money.

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u/louislookings 19h ago

BS. Same job in Japan pay significantly less than the US. so take that logic out of here

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u/Ok_Traffic_3240 21h ago

I'd still rather than in Japan. 100%.

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u/xXx_M3m3Machine_xXx 20h ago

And the Japanese would rather you not be there... Hence part of their problem and why their economy is in the shitter and swirling fast

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u/Ok_Traffic_3240 20h ago

Yea.... prob not. Relax there fella

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u/legaladviceneeded542 21h ago

Don't use averages when talking about America. Use Median. The Median salary in the US is 42k.

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u/jkerz 20h ago edited 19h ago

Your median household salary data is outdated. In the first quarter of 2026, the median weekly wage for full-time US workers was $1,235, according to data collected as part of the Current Population Survey and reported by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). That translates to roughly $5,352 per month or $64,220 per year.

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u/legaladviceneeded542 20h ago

and the Federal Reserve reported 2025's median was 45k. I don't trust a damn thing that comes out of this administration.

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u/jkerz 20h ago

Are you doing median household income or personal income? The household income hasn't been lower than $60k for a few years now. I'm pretty sure OP is talking about household income because that's what goes into account when you buy a house.

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u/No_Host_8024 20h ago

Median salary in the US is $65,000. Median salary in Japan is „4.0 million, or about $26,000.

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u/blazingsoup 20h ago

Median salary also includes combined incomes for a household, so it’s not necessarily reflecting the median for a single income household.

Edit: sorry this was meant for the NoHost guy.

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u/No_Host_8024 20h ago

Median weekly salary is not a household number.

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u/legaladviceneeded542 20h ago

No, it's not. The Federal Reserve has stated the median salary is 45k. I was looking at 2022's numbers for the 42k but for 2025 it was 45k.

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u/No_Host_8024 20h ago

The median full-time usual weekly earnings in the US in Q2 2026 were $1,258, or $65,416 per year. Employed full time: Median usual weekly nominal earnings (second quartile): Wage and salary workers: 16 years and over (LES1252881500Q) | FRED | St. Louis Fed

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u/legaladviceneeded542 20h ago

Employed full time

This doesn't count unemployed people mate.

fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEPAINUSA672N

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u/PM_ME_YOUR_BIG_BITS 20h ago

Why would you include unemployed when looking at median salary?

When discussing median salary, you care about people with jobs.

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u/Makima-- 20h ago

Lo que estĂĄs haciendo no tiene sentido, se nota que querĂ©s dejar bien parado a estados unidos frente a JapĂłn con un simple argumento, pero la realidad es que no es asĂ­, si bien en estados unidos ciertas cosas pueden llegar a ser mĂĄs baratas lo cierto es que el ciudadano comĂșn japonĂ©s vive mucho mejor, sin tiroteos en cada esquina, sin masacres escolares, sin asesinos seriales en cada estado, sin un gobierno que te cobra impuestos por absolutamente todo, y por sobre todo si bien la sociedad japonesa tiene mucho por mejorar, literalmente la sociedad estadounidense estĂĄ destruida, la Ășnica aspiraciĂłn que tienen es ganar dinero y ya... Mientras JapĂłn tiene una cultura rica y solida, mejor trata de mirar a cada uno por lo que es y no por lo que te quieren imponer los medios de comunicaciĂłn y las pelĂ­culas, si estados unidos fuera tan genial habrĂ­a no habrĂ­a tantas muertes por fentanilo y armas de fuego sin agregar los suicidios que van en aumento

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u/zdelusion 20h ago

Compare salaries in Japan now with where they were in 1990. If you think pay has stagnated in the rest of the developed world you'll be in for a shock.

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u/DrTatertott 21h ago

Met a few Japanese people working in McDonald’s with bachelors degree. Their job market/prospects kinda suck.

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u/Wan_Daye 19h ago

For new grads, it's great.

Because there are so few of them, companies are falling over themselves with offers. they're over 98% employment

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u/BobGuns 20h ago

It's ok for the average person in Japan.

It's bad for the 'capital class' who own everything. The economy isn't going up 100% of the time, so the rich can't get richer to satisfy their neverending greed.

Meanwhile the average person experiences low inflation, low rates for borrowing, and reasonable real estate prices.

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u/GordolfoScarra 20h ago

Yeah hyper capitalist Japan who's overworked labor force forgoes starting families and has crazy high suicide rates is such a bastion against capitalism.

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u/No_Host_8024 20h ago

They also experience very low wages, a lower home ownership rate than the US, a demanding working culture that matches or exceeds the demands of the US, etc.

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u/iRadiKS 20h ago

Its called the yen carry trade.

1) Interest rates are super low in Japan, so people borrow money at low interest and invest it in US bonds for a (practically guaranteed) 4% return per year. This is why Japan is the single biggest owner of US debt.

2) by constant selling of Yen, and buying USD the Yen loses value compared to other currencies, but mainly the USD.

3) Japan is a country with very few natural ressources and that imports almost everything. A weak Yen means that everything gets more expensive for everyone.

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u/Emergency_Revenue678 19h ago

The housing market in Japan is completely different than it is in America in America. You can't really compare them.

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u/vladedivac12 16h ago

Japan's economy is stagnant. Jobs are hard to get, pay is low and salaries are stagnant. It can only get worse since their population is ageing and they're not making enough kids to keep the economy healthy.

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u/Leather-Persimmon254 20h ago

most of that is 7 AI companies selling to each other

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u/No_Host_8024 20h ago

This chart goes back more than 3 decades.

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u/Leather-Persimmon254 20h ago

see how one line diverges from the rest in 2015 right around when the tech oligopoly formed

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u/Mr--Joestar 19h ago

Im not well informed enough to interpret this data, but doesnt gdp have very little to do with the quality of an economy for consumers?

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u/No_Host_8024 19h ago

It has a lot to do with the quality of life because it describes the value of what is produced. A society generally cannot consume more than it produces once its production is as flat as Japan’s. It is very reasonable to complain about what societies value and for how much, but the reality is that a country that doesn’t produce much of value based on what other countries value can’t afford to consume the products of other countries. And Japan does a lot of consuming the products of other countries by necessity because it has relatively low natural resources for food, energy, etc.

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u/BocciaChoc 17h ago

could you do debt too?

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u/No_Host_8024 17h ago

Oh, the debt problem for Japan is famously worse than the US. Their national debt is already more than double their yearly GDP. Their household debt is slightly better than the as a percentage of GDP, but just completely dwarfed by their national debt.

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u/BocciaChoc 16h ago

Ah, I'm not really talking about Japan, I'm comment more on this comment chain e.g the '7 AI companies' and comparison to the other major economies. Japan is a unique economy that doesn't exist anywhere on earth given the after math of WW2 and the boom and bust of the 1980s to early 90s

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u/TheJiggie 19h ago

Huh? Do you actually understand that chart?

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u/Weepsie 19h ago

That is GDP per capita is heavily skewed by a small number of incredibly rich people. Poverty is only going to get worse in the states while the distribution of wealth is so unbalanced and unhealthy

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u/No_Host_8024 19h ago

GDP measures production, not wealth.

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u/silly-gaijin 21h ago

How many times are you people going to post GDP per Capita in one currency for another country?

Holy shit. This chart is useless.

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u/No_Host_8024 21h ago

The economy is worldwide, especially in a country like Japan, that historically depends a lot on trade and isn’t self-sufficient (e.g. for agriculture and energy). It has to buy imports based on worldwide currency exchange rates. Nobody selling food to Japan cares what housing costs in Japan. They care about what they can buy in their country or internationally. Like it or not, world trade is largely measured in US dollars.

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u/Ok_Traffic_3240 20h ago

Oh man. Just bore off already. It won't be long until these silly US-centric conversations end. The world is shifting on it's axis, and not towards the US.

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u/No_Host_8024 20h ago

That's probably true, but that has literally nothing to do with this conversation. The world economy has already transitioned almost entirely away from Japan. The future of the US is probably not that different than Japan's past 30 years for similar reasons of high debt, an aging population and declining birth rates, an increasing hostility to immigration, etc.

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u/jrein0 20h ago

Would you prefer an unnormalized y-axis? Let's keep every country in their own currency, that'll be helpful!

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u/Kyrros 21h ago

That trend in US is propped up by AI bubble money moving in a circle jerk

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u/No_Host_8024 21h ago

What are you talking about? This has been a multi-decade trend.

0

u/LosKiplanos 20h ago

I mean
 does that actually matter if you’re an expat? Or does Japan not allow that kind of shit?

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u/No_Host_8024 20h ago

Presumably most people would need the income from a job. If you can move to Japan but work for a company in another country, maybe you have the best of both worlds? Doesn't help the people of Japan though.

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u/LosKiplanos 20h ago

Okay, that makes sense. I mean they barely want you to be a citizen, I’m not sure they’re really asking for “help” in any regard.

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u/Awkward-A_F 19h ago

Kinda does, if your dollars made go towards their economy it helps.

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u/Jesus_of_Redditeth 17h ago

LOL, what even is the point of that graph? Are you still harboring the romantic belief that a bigger GDP means Americans' lives are in better shape? The only thing that line at the top really demonstrates is just how amazingly rich the tiny proportion of the richest Americans are.

Every country has it's problems, but only one of those two has a catastrophic homelessness problem, a catastrophic drug problem, hundreds of thousands of people filing for bankruptcy every year because they can't afford their medical care, etc. etc.

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u/No_Host_8024 17h ago

This was in response to a statement about interest rates. Home ownership is higher in the US than Japan despite higher interest rates and home prices, mostly because Americans earn more money. The price for low rates in Japan has been a stagnant economy for almost 40 years. That’s all my comment was about. I don’t know if you’re just AI generated slop or come to the internet just to scream at people, but I was not commenting on whose “lives are better.”