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Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

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Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#61

Post by dennis_jeeves2 »

klausa wrote: post #55
cedws wrote: post #35

As a Brit living in Japan (non-resident) I think they should protect themselves at all costs, lest what happened to my country happen to theirs. If the business visa was abused, that abuse should be stopped, not just allowed to happen like we would do.

I'm sorry, you're simultaneously (somehow?) living here as a non-resident, and complaining about people _abusing the system_? That's pretty rich, gotta say!

>That's pretty rich, gotta say!

He still can think objectively, that's what it means.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#62

Post by ekjhgkejhgk »

klausa wrote: post #55
cedws wrote: post #35

As a Brit living in Japan (non-resident) I think they should protect themselves at all costs, lest what happened to my country happen to theirs. If the business visa was abused, that abuse should be stopped, not just allowed to happen like we would do.

I'm sorry, you're simultaneously (somehow?) living here as a non-resident, and complaining about people _abusing the system_? That's pretty rich, gotta say!

I think they're the kind of people who would argue that the "immigrants" should be kept out, but "expats" are ok.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#63

Post by tokai »

consp wrote: post #50
TFNA wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A number of European countries have allowed this; the 2010s were the heyday of this path. But it turns out that a lot of the people with big money to buy residence, got their money from organized crime, and it isn’t always easy to vet applicants (or corrupt officials could overlook the applicant’s background).

The Maltese route is still open but a bit different since 2025. It's now citizenship by merit (aka the old by investment, since dumping money is considered a cultural contribution).

Malta is also famously corrupt and a safe haven for criminals.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#64

Post by timr »

klausa wrote: post #59
timr wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s rich about it? You can live in Japan as a non-resident and still be following 100% of the rules. I agree with the GP. It’s their country. They set the rules. If they want to change the rules because those rules aren’t working for them , that’s their prerogative. As a USian, I’m actually sort of jealous that they have the ability to make changes so quickly.

>You can live in Japan as a non-resident and still be following 100% of the rules. Not for any reasonable definition of "live in", you can't.

Well, it depends a little on what OP meant by “resident” - often that gets used by expats to mean “permanent resident”, which is a pretty high bar.

But even if you just assume that OP is here on the digital nomad visa thing, you’re effectively living here. More to the point, you’re following the rules, and it’s not at all ironic or contradictory to have an opinion that the rules can be changed by the host.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#65

Post by nradov »

torben-friis wrote: post #23
fc417fc802 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like letting people buy their way in to visas is actually a pretty good system from a strictly pragmatic standpoint but 5 million yen seems far too low.

>I feel like letting people buy their way in to visas is actually a pretty good system That depends of what you're hoping to prevent. If you want to filter out people who can't sustain themselves, petty crime or the like, it works. But it can open the door to a lot of unwanted effects. A foreign national that just extracts capital by capturing real state and collecting rent is a great example, this person is a large…

If foreign nationals are able to extract a lot of capital through rents then that's a sign that the government has made it too difficult to develop new rental housing.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#66

Post by rayiner »

> Foreign business owners could lose their residency status after the government increased the capital requirement from 5 million yen (approx. $31,000) to 30 million yen (approx. $187,000).1

A $31,000 capital requirement for a "business" is a joke. A food cart--not a truck, just a cart--requires more capital than that.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#67

Post by nradov »

embedding-shape wrote: post #48
junon wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuine question: how so? I'm not familiar with the economics of this.

The general feedback loop is "have lots of money === easier to make more money", and doing so via passive approaches like "own property, rent it out" basically spirals out of control to a few owning a lot, unless you try to restrict it somehow. Add in that "vacation rentals" is hugely interesting for real estate owners as you get so much more per owned property, and suddenly local residents are even harder hit by pro…

The notion of earning "passive income" as a landlord is a total fantasy. The reality is that it takes a lot of work. Otherwise tenants, vendors, and property managers will wreck the assets and rob you blind.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#68

Post by rayiner »

timr wrote: post #47
tristanj wrote: post #2

A large number of Airbnb hosts were using this Business Manager Visa as a way to stay in Japan. People in China realized they could just buy/lease a guesthouse in Osaka / any tourist hotspot, and rent it out on Airbnb. Then they become a "business manager" and get a Japanese resident visa within 3 months. All you needed is to invest 5million yen, which is like 31k USD, which isn't much. People wrote entire online gui…

Yep. There was also a proliferation of Indian restaurants in the major cities, for the same basic reason. (Though I have to say that seems like a much harder road than operating a guesthouse for people from your own country, which is what I presume was the Chinese approach.) Since you can bring in relatives on this kind of visa, I’ve heard the expression “One curry pot equals three people” . There have been stories i…

> Since you can bring in relatives on this kind of visa, I’ve heard the expression “One curry pot equals three people”.

Family reunification is a gaping loophole in any skilled immigration law and developed countries need to seriously limit it. The New York Times did a good podcast on how uncapped family reunification ended up being a loophole that totally overturned all the limits and compromises in the 1965 immigration reform laws in the U.S.: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/29/podcasts/the-daily/electi...

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#69

Post by jonathanstrange »

A dying country that doesn't want small business to continue, that's not something I had in my 2026 bingo card collection. Be that as it may, I would just close down the business and incorporate elsewhere. Let them sort out their population crisis on their own, I'm sure children will magically pop out of nowhere.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#70

Post by akg_67 »

timr wrote: post #56
klausa wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry, you're simultaneously (somehow?) living here as a non-resident, and complaining about people _abusing the system_? That's pretty rich, gotta say!

What’s rich about it? You can live in Japan as a non-resident and still be following 100% of the rules. I agree with the GP. It’s their country. They set the rules. If they want to change the rules because those rules aren’t working for them , that’s their prerogative. As a USian, I’m actually sort of jealous that they have the ability to make changes so quickly.

Double standards. He is an immigrant in Japan but he doesn’t want immigrants both in his host (Japan) and home (UK) countries. Pretty ironic come to think of. I guess he thinks his type are “good” immigrants, others are not so much.
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