As home ownership becomes increasingly expensive, some Australians have decided to buy up in Japan where millions of abandoned houses, known as ‘akiya’, are being sold cheaply or given away for free.
When JayaThursfield faced the question of where to put down roots for his young family, he was torn between his home country, Australia, and Japan, the home country of his wife Chihiro.
Since buying the house, Thursfield has spent $250,000 on renovations and has documented the process on his now viral YouTube page.According to the Japanese government’s most recent data from its 2018 Housing and Land survey, there are about 8.5 million akiya scattered around Japan. But estimates by the Nomura Research Institute suggest this number exceeds 11 million.
“When we first managed to get a sneak peek of the house and got through the overgrown vegetation to the front of the house, it was just huge. The roof was massive, the size of the house was massive. I was blown away,” he said.“It was full of other people's stuff. You still had pictures of the previous owner's grandparents on the walls. There were still old noodle bowls in the sink. The kitchen was an absolute disaster, and there were still things in the fridge.
Since buying the house, the Thursfields have spent $250,000 on renovations, which the first-time renovator has documented on his now viral YouTube page. For Thursfield, every dollar spent was worth it. Earlier this year, Japan’s government began offering families who relocate from Tokyo to the countryside 1 million yen - about $10,000 - per child.
Long-time residents of Japan, Parker Allen and Matt Ketchum run a Tokyo-based company, Akiya and Inaka, that helps foreigners buy abandoned homes.There are no visa or residency requirements for foreigners to buy a house in Japan, but owning a house doesn’t mean an automatic visa or citizenship.
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