Episode 02 No One Will Buy Unless the Old House Is Demolished?

The Shijukunichi memorial service of Shigeru, Yoko’s Father, was held on October 21st, 2017(Friday).

Shijukunichi is when a family reunites 49 days after someone's death.

Both Yoko’s and Shu’s family gathered again in Yodoe.

After the ceremony, everyone gathered and looked at pictures while talking about memories of their parents(grandparents).

Then somebody brought up what to do with this house and land.

Shu said, “As I mentioned on the funeral day, I have a house in Yokohama so I have no intention of moving back here. What is your plan, Yoko?”

Yoko replied to his question, “First, I was planning to move back to Yodoe 10 years from now to support Dad. But he is gone, and I guess I don’t have to spend my retirement in Yodoe. My son, Yoshikuni, recommends selling this house since it is hard for him to visit me here. If your children are not interested in this house as well, I may consider selling it.”

First, Yoko visited the Yonago City Town Office Daisen Branch to obtain “Nayose-cho.” This is the list of fixed asset tax ledgers created by municipalities, categorized by owner.

 Residential land: Approximately 700 square meters (7,534 square feet) and 8.93 million yen in appraised value.

• Building: Approximately 200 square meters (2,152 square feet) and 500,000 yen in appraised value.
• The land where the garage is Approximately 57 square meters (614 square feet) and 520,000 yen in appraised value.
• Garage: Approximately 17 square meters (205 square feet) and 90,000 yen in appraised value.
• Fields around the house: Approximately 1,150 square meters (12,389 square feet) and 110,000 yen in appraised value.
• Rice field across Route 9: Approximately 3,500 square meters (37,674 square feet) and 460,000 yen in appraised value.
• Rice field by the oceanfront (in Daisen Town): Approximately 452 square meters (4,865 square feet) and 30,000 yen in appraised value.

Yoko also found out how much property tax her father was paying. It was discouraging to find out that the assessed value of land in rural areas is relatively low, and it is even worse for farmlands compared to residential land. She also went to the Legal Affairs Bureau to obtain a certified copy of the registration and found out that the building was not registered, which is typical for old houses in Japan.

After understanding the values of lands and buildings, Yoko contacted two real estate agents she found online.

The first company came to visit the site. However, as soon as he saw the place, he said, “I don’t think you will find a buyer for your house and lands.”

According to him, young people prefer clean houses even though they are small. He also told her that the house needed to be demolished, and farmlands could not be sold unless they were transformed into residential land.

After telling me the information, he went back to his office without doing further marketing.

Yoko and Shu visited the second company together.

The staff said, “Please give us time to calculate the estimate. I will also find out some information about your lands and what you can do with it.”

So Yoko and Shu went back to their own home at that moment.

A few days later, they received an email from the company. Unfortunately, they found that changing rice fields across Route 9 to residential land is quite a hassle since they need permission from the prefectural governor’s office.

The total estimates of the house and lands were:

1. 6.9 million yen if you keep the building
2. 8.7 million yen if you demolish the building with the cost of 2.86 million yen 

It was quite shocking for them to find out that, unlike the city location,  the actual value of these buildings and lands was lower than what they expected from the appraised value.

The conclusion they came up with about the house was not to do anything for a year until the first-year memorial of their father’s death.