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RobBright

SnowJapan Member
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Posts posted by RobBright

  1. Just out of interest. If you go to Mr House Making company, will they clearly explain all of the costs to you?

    And give you various excite stimulations that show you which is actually the best way to do things?

    Or do you have to go visit banks and scrimp around to find out yourself?

     

    Yeah they do. We got a breakdown of ALL the costs. Sounds great, but when they break down where all the money goes, even down to the 25,000yen for locks and keys, it gets a bit boring after a bit.

     

    And that's before you sign for the mortgage, as by law, they have to read through the WHOLE mortgage contract, with a witness and a lawyer present, before you sign it. 4 hours of your life gone.

  2. Hey SJ Family

     

    I was wondering if anyone knows if your are able to buy property in Japan being an Australian? An if so is it a pain staking process?

     

    Are you in Japan? If not, then you could do it, but it would not be easy.

     

    Well we have just put a deposit down on a plot of land in Kobuchizawa, next step will be getting a house built on it.

    It is a pain in the rear end for us foreigners, but not impossible just involves tons of paper work and time, so my wife is going to deal with that under her name as she is Japanese it is much more simple.

     

    If you live in Japan, yeah, it's not so bad. Can only imagine the headache if I were applying from overseas.

  3. We went with a 変動、or floating rate in the end, and our interest rate is set at 0.85% or something crazy like that. We are told 6months in advanced if the rate is going to go up, and how much it will go to with also monthly payment costs. It really is cheaper to buy a house than rent; however, the land is the important part of the purchase. Choose a decent plot somewhere and you can expect it to go up in value, or at least hold.

     

    Moreover, be prepared to negotiate the price, as most , if not all, agents fees and costs can be brought down. We managed to get about 1.6mil yen off, simply by arguing that the house lacked this or that, and we waited to buy it, about 3 months or so, risky but we were in no rush, and also we were prepared to use the estate agent's preferred bank to get a loan, rather than our own.

     

    When you do apply for a mortgage, make sure you have documentation of your working for the previous year, especially if you or your partner has taken time off work, as this will affect the process. Paying off cash is MUCH better, but if you do get a loan, get one that does not penalise you for paying off lumps sums. We pay about 1.5mil extra a year, which is not too difficult to do at the moment, but it means later on during the mortgage period, we can relax a bit more with repayments.

  4. Well first of all, scout out a place where you would like to live, and focus on finding some houses, or plots of land, in and around that area.

     

    Stuff like house taxes are all affected by the land value the local authorities have set on that land, which can go up or down. Moreover, pay attention to how the restrictions on how much you can build on. Sometimes you might only be able to use 60% of the available land for building.

  5. Ii ne, one of the good things about living near the big city!

     

    Not when you miss the last train home, and in a drunken stupor end up in the wrong prefecture to where you live, and get a taxi home from Tokyo to home.

     

    Fingers burnt, lesson learnt.

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