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Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

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Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#71

Post by titanix2 »

corey_moncure wrote: post #69
mettamage wrote: post #52

So wait, there are places where there are houses being given away (e.g. US, Japan and Italy as far as I know) and I'm a person that has the ability to work remotely. Am I missing something? Is this my ticket to cheap housing and a more stress free life? At what point am I going to be scammed and/or disappointed?

The point where these houses have no insulation in the walls, no air conditioning or heat and a septic system that must be manually pumped. Have fun in winter!

Totally true. Actually even more modern buildings are made to be (somewhat) cool in summer and no care at all is done about winter. So each room/apartment is warmed individually using air-conditioner instead of having a central heating per building.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#72

Post by squish78 »

mettamage wrote: post #52

So wait, there are places where there are houses being given away (e.g. US, Japan and Italy as far as I know) and I'm a person that has the ability to work remotely. Am I missing something? Is this my ticket to cheap housing and a more stress free life? At what point am I going to be scammed and/or disappointed?

Fixing a dilapidated house is not a stress free life

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#73

Post by blocked_again »

titanix2 wrote: post #56
beager wrote: post #47

Isn't it prohibitively hard to reside in Japan as an outsider? How can they expect to move up to 8mm houses unless predominantly to existing Japanese? Am I missing something?

Yes, you're missing that foreigners are not the target of these deals. Also it's not terribly complicated to get a visa to come here: you basically need at least a bachelor degree and to find a job. Given how the job market is starving for employees, it is not really hard. I know a half-dozen people of my country and my age that did it.

Aren't software engineers treated badly in Japan?

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#74

Post by becauseiam »

mettamage wrote: post #52

So wait, there are places where there are houses being given away (e.g. US, Japan and Italy as far as I know) and I'm a person that has the ability to work remotely. Am I missing something? Is this my ticket to cheap housing and a more stress free life? At what point am I going to be scammed and/or disappointed?

Owning property or land in Japan does not give you right to reside within the country and you will still need to get some sort of visa in place in order to move in.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#75

Post by dahdum »

discordianfish wrote: post #64
ransom1538 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Detroit: If you have a credit card and a want to own an apartment building, it is the place to be. Just needs some elbow grease. There MUST BE opportunity at $5 USD per square foot -- but it is hard to visualize. https://www.point2homes.com/US/Multi-Family-For-Sale/MI/Detr... [I think you can talk this guy down to $10k].

If they’d throw in a working visa I’d be intrigued

If you could pull that off, sounds like an incredible program to me. I don't think anything could revitalize Detroit like large amounts of immigrants would.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#76

Post by dsfyu404ed »

coldtea wrote: post #38
bobthepanda wrote: post #27

The US saw similar efforts in Detroit and other Rust Belt cities. That mostly just resulted in asset flippers hoarding houses and letting them fall into further disrepair. I wonder what steps Japan is taking to mitigate that possibility.

Only a property in Detroit in the deserted areas could mean frequent meetings with muggings, violence, etc. In Japan it will just be a regular house.

I have lived in crappy neighborhoods[1][2]. Violence is not likely to be an issue as long as you don't inject yourselves into your neighbors' business it's really not the big deal the upper classes make it out to be with all their hand wringing. Violent crime doesn't really happen that often per capita (i.e. odds are it will never happen to you). Not getting involved with drugs is like 90% of the battle. If you do get unlucky and encounter crime it's probably going to take the form of someone stealing something from your yard.

I think you either need to already be comfortable living somewhere like that in order to do so stress free.

[1] https://www.neighborhoodscout.com/ma/fitchburg/crime

[2] https://www.neighborhoodscout.com/ma/new-bedford/crime

Edit: This reminds me of every time crappy minimum wage jobs come up. I have first hand experience with and offer my opinion but then get told that I have no idea what I'm talking about. The filter bubble is real.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#77

Post by pj_mukh »

mettamage wrote: post #52

So wait, there are places where there are houses being given away (e.g. US, Japan and Italy as far as I know) and I'm a person that has the ability to work remotely. Am I missing something? Is this my ticket to cheap housing and a more stress free life? At what point am I going to be scammed and/or disappointed?

Is it just me or is the prospect of working from home in the middle of nowhere terrifying?

When you work from home, you wanna leave home often, where do you go if you're in the middle of nowhere?

I work from home in the middle of a dense city, pay a premium for it! You leave home and there are about 100 places (cafes, theatres, museums, parks etc.) I can go to that are walking distance. Is that possible in say rural Michigan, where housing is apparently practically free?

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#78

Post by samstave »

rmason wrote: post #43
coldtea wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only a property in Detroit in the deserted areas could mean frequent meetings with muggings, violence, etc. In Japan it will just be a regular house.

Actually if you look at what happened to the majority of homes that were rehabbed that's not the case. Most of them were in the downtown area and crime actually went down. Grant you there were urban pioneers that chose less than desirable areas but they were the exception. In Detroit the formal program run by the city that gave away houses mandated that they be rehabbed and inhabited by the person receiving them for…

So, what if you purchased these with the express intent to tear them down and install pre-built tiny-homes on them.

So you effectively get a plot of land, with service-hookups and low property taxes. but you can install beautiful, yet-tiny home on it.

http://windrivertinyhomes.com has amazing units.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#79

Post by natalyarostova »

bobthepanda wrote: post #27

The US saw similar efforts in Detroit and other Rust Belt cities. That mostly just resulted in asset flippers hoarding houses and letting them fall into further disrepair. I wonder what steps Japan is taking to mitigate that possibility.

As an object level fact, Japan has a homogeneous culture centered around honor, which is much different from Detroit.

Re: Japan Is Giving Away 8M Abandoned Houses

#80

Post by endorphone »

ransom1538 wrote: post #42
bobthepanda wrote: post #27

The US saw similar efforts in Detroit and other Rust Belt cities. That mostly just resulted in asset flippers hoarding houses and letting them fall into further disrepair. I wonder what steps Japan is taking to mitigate that possibility.

Detroit: If you have a credit card and a want to own an apartment building, it is the place to be. Just needs some elbow grease. There MUST BE opportunity at $5 USD per square foot -- but it is hard to visualize. https://www.point2homes.com/US/Multi-Family-For-Sale/MI/Detr... [I think you can talk this guy down to $10k].

Saying it's the place to be seems a bit an overreach. That building, as an example, is in a neighborhood that is just block after block of wasteland, with derelict abandoned houses falling to disrepair, and the empty lots where they removed them before. This particular building likely has no furnace, pipes were probably removed, and almost certainly requires many tens of thousands in upgrades.

It seems like illusory opportunity. There are areas of Detroit where some of the grand old homes are being resurrected and there have been opportunities, but this isn't one of them.

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