「家建てるよー😄」(We will be building a house)
I suddenly received a LINE message from my husband.
What’s with the sudden announcement??
Apparently, my husband’s uncle’s old factory was so run down that they had to tear it down and dispose of it. So we now have a large piece of land with nothing on it. That’s good and all, but in Japan, land that is not purposefully used is taxed way more than if they were used for some purpose. For example, a land with nothing on it is taxed six times more than if a house were on it.
Since the land which housed the factory was so huge at 205 tsubo (approx. 677m2), the land tax that is payable each year would cost over a million yen. To get at least a part of it down to one-sixth of the price, it was decided that a house should be built on top of it.
Our house. Yay.
Time for lots of research and planning.
Come join us in our journey!
May 2022
28th – Looked for interior design apps that could allow us design our ideal home
29th – Started using the app “Home Design 3D” to create mock-ups of our home
June 2022
4th – Visited home-builder Tamahome
5th – Visited home-builder Daiwa House and Shuko Build
11th – Visited Shuko Build (2nd time)
12th – Visited Daiwa House (2nd time)
18th – Visited Tamahome (3rd time) and home-builder K
19th – Visited home-builder E and Daiwa House (3rd time)
外国女子が日本で国際交流員になって感じたことがヤバい件 
wow thats really interesting! to research on how to build your own house and build it
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Indeed! It’s an adventure in itself, which requires a lot of money, haha
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Wow, what an exciting task for you! I think I have read that it is more common to build a new house in Japan than it is here in the USA, so the average house is much newer. Does that match what you are experiencing there? It is hard to get building permits in most of the cities where I have lived; my brother had to wait six months just to get inspections of the power utilities for a house he is building. He thinks it is partly because he’s just one man building with a partner, not a big developer, but the process has been so frustrating, he says he won’t do it again.
I hope you enjoy designing your own home! I know I would love to watch a paper plan become reality someday… Maybe my retirement home? 🙂
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I’m not sure about what it is like in the US, but I think it is quite common to build a new house here in Japan. I don’t think building permits are hard to get here. The weather conditions and many natural disasters here are not kind to houses, so it affects the lifespan of the houses. There are a lot of house-building companies in Japan. I will write up about the various types of companies next time in my blog post as well! I hope you’ll be able to build your retirement home someday 🙂
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