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https://www.sbs.com.au/news/dateline/article/how-jaya-bought-the-australian-dream-for-30-000-in-japan/yalywsys5>
"When Jaya Thursfield 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.
“We decided to come to Japan mainly because the house prices in Melbourne were
way beyond our budget,” the 47-year-old told SBS Dateline.
“I'd heard about ‘akiya’, so we decided to move to my wife's hometown and find
a cheaper place to live.”
Akiya are unwanted homes, mostly in the Japanese countryside, that have been
abandoned as a side effect of Japan’s severe population decline and a trend
toward urban living. Ninety per cent of Japan’s 125 million residents live in
cities.
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.
Akiya make up approximately 14 per cent of the country’s housing stock and
unless action is taken, it’s forecast they could exceed 30 per cent of all
houses in Japan by 2033.
In an effort to combat the problem, these vacant houses are listed in
government-run ‘akiya banks’ and can be snatched up for a bargain.
Thursfield found his akiya in Ibaraki prefecture, about an hour’s drive
north-east of Tokyo, via a newspaper advertisement. He bought it for $30,000, a
fraction of the median Australian house price of about $890,000. House prices
in Australia have been tipped
to rise further in 2023."
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*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
