BestFSBOGuide.com team
Kenji Tanaka
Japan contributor
Covers selling a home in Japan from the owner's side, working from primary sources: the settlement day (kessai) where a judicial scrivener (shiho shoshi) verifies the documents and title transfers at the Legal Affairs Bureau, the discharge of an existing mortgage, boundary confirmation, and the transfer income tax that the 30 million yen residence deduction usually softens or erases.
Most guides to Japanese property are written for buyers, often for foreigners. This desk covers the other side of the table: the owner who has decided to sell, who may have inherited an empty house in the countryside, and who needs to know what actually has to happen and who has to be in the room. No agent is legally required, but the judicial scrivener at settlement is the one professional a private seller does not improvise around.
The boundary is where private sellers most often lose time. A buyer’s scrivener will not wave through a fuzzy property line, and arranging a confirmation survey after a buyer is already waiting is how a clean deal turns into a three-month wait. Then there is the paperwork chain: the certified register copy, the seal certificate, the title information, and the fixed asset valuation. Each is cheap and routine, but slow to chase if it starts late.
Tax is the part most worth demystifying. Sellers brace for a big bill and often owe nothing, because a home they lived in qualifies for the 30 million yen deduction. The practical rule: keep the original purchase records, file the transfer income honestly the following spring, and consult a tax accountant before assuming either the best case or the worst.
Areas of focus
- Tracks Japanese property registration and the kessai settlement procedure at the Legal Affairs Bureau
- Follows seller-side transfer income tax rules, including the 30 million yen residence deduction
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