Article on Real Estate in Japan and a New Blog
March 31, 2005
I found a great article on buying foreclosure properties in Japan.
David Markle, a long-time resident of Japan shows how it can be done. I have written briefly about this before and have included some information on sites that you can view these properties on. I have yet to go through with a sale on one of these properties, but I have read quite a bit about the process.
Please let me know if anyone would like any further info.
I was thinking of starting a new blog or website. I was thinking of writing about Japanese business or latest products in Japan, but I am not sure if it would create much interest so I have started to think of:
- something which has broad interest (across several countries)
- something a little personal. People seem to be much more interested and come back more often to a blog if it is a continuing saga
- has high paying keywords.
Stay tuned.
CMS Systems
March 30, 2005
I have been trying to work on another web-site created all in static HTML. It really is time consuming and I feel so unmotivated to work on the site.
Therefore I have been looking into a Content Management System. One of the reasons blogging is so easy, is that you can create an entry in about 10 minutes without having to write any code and the site can be updated at the push of a button.
I was thinking of creating another blog, but I think just updating one blog is already enough work. I want to create an information resource on Tokyo in English for foreigners. There are plenty of sites out there, but nothing specifically for Tokyo.
CMS Matrix is a great website for comparing different CMS systems. I was thinking of maybe Mambo and they offer hosting from only $5 a month.
If anyone has any experience with a good CMS system, please let me know.
Japanese Websites
March 29, 2005
An alert reader has pointed out that some of the Japanese text wasn’t showing correctly. I have added the following encoding to every page:
meta http-equiv=”Content-Type” content=”text/html; charset=Shift_JIS”
And I have changed the font to MS Minchul. I hope it is working better now. I think after adding a few more available properties to the site I will start an Adwords campaign. I just don’t have the time to wait for Google to index the site and it’s going to be much harder and time consuming to try and get people to link to the site with everything in Japanese.
New Site
March 28, 2005
I have had the day off today for the day I worked last Saturday. I taken the time to work on my new site and today it has gone live! It still needs a lot more work done on it, but I thought it was good enough to upload so it can (hopefully) start to get indexed by Google. It is also my first site, entirely in Japanese. I might add some English info later.
You can take a look here: www.ozfudosan.com
When I get the text fixed up a bit more I will probably kick off my marketing with an Adwords campaign. It is really hard starting a new site. Usually the sites that appear in the top search results have been around for years, with hundreds of pages of content.
“Fudosan” means realestate in Japanese. I thought it was a reasonable domain name to get. I am hosting the site with doteasy, which provides free web hosting without any advertising. The domain name cost $20 at doteasy and the translation of the text has cost close to $300.
I don’t know if I will get any customers but I think the business worth a try at starting. If I don’t get any customers, I will probably put on some Adsense on the site and try to make it into an information site for Japanese moving to Australia.
I really admire what this guy is doing: www.9rules.com “1 man, 9 sites and counting…”. He claims that his best month generated around US$10,000. I like the simple design of his sites. He seems to have created some great templates, so if he has a new idea for a site it probably doesn’t take any time to get it live.
Also, if you have one big popular site, you can just add some links from the big site to the new site and you will be indexed by Google in no time. Just don’t link back the new site to the old site, which can work against you.
Saying Yes to Japan
March 26, 2005
Tim Clark and Carl Kay have just finished writing a book titled, “Saying Yes to Japan“. It is not released yet, but you can read the first chapter from their website: www.sayingyestojapan.com
I agree with everything they wrote, especially what they write about realestate and obtaining finance in Japan. I believe there are so many opportunities to bring businesses to Japan in areas which Japanese companies provide bad or uncompetitive service.
I am looking forward to reading their book.
Tokyo Inspections
March 23, 2005
Last night, I went and took a look at the aparment I mentioned in my previous post. It was tiny to say the least. They were asking 4.3 million yen (about US$43K). I tried to offer 2.5 and the agent just lauged. The apartment block is on rented land, so you have to pay 2000 yen per month. Total outgoings are 14,000 yen. So if the apartment is vacant for any period, you are going to be losing a fair bit of money.
The bathroom also looked very old and one of the panels on the bath was missing. At least it was interesting to see what the cheapest apartments in Tokyo looked like.
I couldn’t really imagine any Japanese being interested in the place. The way Japanese renovate apartment is usually very expensive, so if I got it cheap I would renovate it cheaply myselft and put in some new curtains, light fittings etc. If you rent a place in Tokyo you usually have to buy these things yourself.
If you are interested in getting an idea of how much it costs to rent in an apartment Tokyo check out this site. Pay also close attention to the actual “move-in” costs. My idea is to charge more but keep the move in cost to just one month depost.
Property Enquiries
March 20, 2005
I have started calling Japanese agents about properties they have advertised on the web. One example is for sale for 5,500,000 yen. Around US$55K. The rent is 55,000 yen per month.
It is actually leased to another real-estate agent who subleases properties to foreigners. The property comes out at a 12% return. The agent probably rents the property for around 90,000 yen. I don’t know how much they would be willing to negotiate, but I think an offer of 4 million yen would be reasonable, which would return 16.5%. If anyone is interested please send me an email and I can pass on the details.
I would prefer to buy something vacant and try to manage it myself. I am going to look at a property tomorrow evening and planning to put in a really low offer and see what their reaction is.
Realestate in Japan
March 20, 2005
I have been looking on the internet for property in Japan. Some are unbelievably cheap. I know most people don’t agree buying property in Japan is a good idea. Decreasing population, decreasing land values and so on.
However, I believe rather than problems, there could be a lot of great opportunities out there. I can buy a one room studio apartment with a bathroom and kitchen for around $US50K. I believe I could rent it out at around $800-$900 a month. A return of around 20%! Believe it or not, but you can actually rent an apartment in Japan which doesn’t have a bathroom or kitchen!
I have written about the cost renting an apartment in Japan before. By not charging “key money”, I could charge slightly higher rent. Just 4 of these and I could be on the retirement path!
I have read about a foreigner that despite the over-supply in office space in Japan, he buys up the tall and narrow, pencil type buildings and converts them into storage lockers. A great example of turning a problem into an opportunity.
Predict the Latest Technology Stocks Game
March 18, 2005
I haven’t registered yet, but this sounds very cool.
http://buzz.research.yahoo.com/bk/index.html
“The Tech Buzz Game is a fantasy prediction market for high-tech products, concepts, and trends. As a player, your goal is to predict how popular various technologies will be in the future. Popularity or buzz is measured by Yahoo! Search frequency over time.
Predictions are made by buying virtual stock in the products or technologies you believe will succeed, and selling stock in the technologies you think will flop. In other words, you “put your play money where your mouth is.”
I can’t believe it’s Saturday and I have to go to work. Hopefully, I can finish early.
Japan Apartments
March 17, 2005
I am looking for my next property now. I am starting to think again about my strategy. I was thinking that maybe I could buy well in Japan. I have found that there are relatively cheap apartments in Tokyo, but still have excellent rental returns.
I figure that I could rent it to a foreigner without them having to pay the usual 6 months up front. There are already companies doing this in Japan, and I have always wanted to get into myself.
The advantages are:
- I can manage it myself
- I can inspect the properties myself
- Very good rental returns
And the disadvantages:
- Little room for capital appreciation
- What to do with non-paying tenants
- Getting finance
Finance is always a tricky one. I don’t mind actally paying more interest than the usual 1-2% and I wouldn’t be borrowing that much if I use some or all of the cash I have on hand.
Also, if it was successful I could sell the idea on to other foreigners.
