Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to the Buying a House in Japan podcast. My name's Take. And I'm Joey. And we're two friends who just quit our corporate jobs and bought a cheap house in rural Japan. The goal of this podcast is to document the highs and lows of the process while informing you of every step you need to take in order for you to do it yourself too. We're by no means experts and we're doing this for the first time, but we hope this gives you a realistic expectation if you embark on this journey yourself and we hope you enjoy the show.
Speaker: All right, here we go, Joey. This is my last final day in Japan. And I think this is our last day before I say version zero is done. How are you doing? Yeah, I'm excited to have like a V zero done. I wouldn't say it's, you know, V one is what we're calling guests ready. V zero is kind of like me and you able to live here already where I feel like me and you can like handle a little bit, uh, grow to your situations.
Speaker: Yes, sir. I'm going to post, uh, I took some videos of our house and kind of where we're leaving it with V zero. Uh, our main goal of when we first kind of, we kind of broke our trips into a couple segments, but V zero was to make it livable for us. The upstairs is livable. The downstairs. Okay. Right. Not too bad, but not the best. Yeah. Little constructions. There's still a big hole on the floor, but
Speaker: Anyways, we're comfortably recording from our second floor of our house. Joey's in the recording lounge. I'm in the Benkyo study room to realize the echo was kind of messing up the audio, but we're feeling pretty good, right?
Speaker: Feeling great. Uh, it's very comfortable up here. Second floor. So, you know, what was that like two weeks worth of effort? Uh, we did, we hustled most days, I would say, uh, we did have some rest days and we took it. We took two different trips to other places in Kyushu, but yeah, but two weeks we can get four rooms, pretty comfortable and started on the rest. Yep.
Speaker: Um, so today what we actually want to talk about is our plans for V1. So version one, I think before we decide to let our friends stay, our parents stay, or honestly feel comfortable with how to present the house. Um, we have kind of worked with our, we call her, what do we call her? Or, uh, what's the word? Fixer. Fixer. There we go. Fixer. Cause that's Michael Cohen, Trump's fixer, Michael Cohen. That's right. That's why I learned that word.
Speaker: So Fumi, our fixer has helped us organize two contractors to come look at our house to do the renovation. We learned a ton. I think each, it was over the past two days. So huge shout outs to Fumi for organizing that. And if you are doing this, you need to find someone like a fixer who could speak Japanese. Definitely.
Speaker: It's been great. Like we're going to talk about contractors as we get into this episode, but, um, I feel like the depth of the conversation with the contractors, like me and you, it wouldn't have, have gone in, in depth that much. They would have really simplified their language with us. And I feel like, especially with the contractors, the having a fixer like Fumi really paid off.
Speaker: Yeah. So before going into that contractor experience, um, want to go a little bit over scope. Again, I'm going to post a video of our house soon. So it all kind of makes sense and shows you, it shows you our layout, but we are again in about a hundred square meter house. I don't know what that translates to in square footage, but it's a pretty big two story house. Uh, both floors have a lot of things we need to redo. So just going off the top joy and no special order, um, and jump in, we're going to be doing the floors.
Speaker: ceilings, we're going to re -wallpaper the walls, we're making the entire bottom floor, like trying to break down every single wall.
Speaker: Oh, there's a lot. I don't know. Keep going. Yeah. It was, um, one. Yeah. So we're removing some to Tommy from two rooms. We're adding news to Tommy to another room. We're, we're doing, we've been calling it a Hori Kotatsu Hori Kotatsu. Um, uh, basically like a sunken, uh, Kotatsu style table. Maybe we'll get the heating on it. Maybe not. Uh, maybe.
Speaker: contractors had had a lot to say there but yeah basically like this large banquet style three meter long table in the tatami room downstairs we're busting it on the wall so it's all open concept black tatami it's like a little bit of a custom room there and then we have a second custom room the
Speaker: shower room, bathroom, uh, we want to do like all concrete kind of things. So those are like, I feel like our most customizable, customize, uh, sort of wishlist for the contractor rooms, everything else, as Tucker said, pretty standard, uh, floors, uh, ceiling, um, walls, that kind of stuff.
Speaker: We originally scoped this as a smaller project. And I feel like this is almost how it always works is that we're like, Oh, we're just going to redo the floors. But of course we found kind of a lot of problems or we want to just do it right. So we really want to make this place nice and comfortable. So I think we're going a little custom, but also, you know, a place that we, again, we were happy to show friends and comfortably stay is the key priority here.
Speaker: And also adding value, you know, if we do decide to flip it in the end. Um, another big thing, we're changing the bathrooms out. I don't know if you've seen those squatty potties, but we have those squatty potties. We're trying to switch it out for a nice Western, I'm sorry. Western style Japanese toilets. So we'll have like the wash bidet thing and, uh, just be like heated toilet seats, be way, 10 ,000 times more comfortable than what we have right now, Jerry.
Speaker: Yeah. Um, actually one thing that was interesting. So those toilet rooms are quite small in our house, like much smaller than a Western bathroom, you know, like almost could be like a 10th of the size of a Western bathroom, like quite small. Um, and it's interesting that, uh, so they're all, the squatters are all at an angle and they said that you, they can also, they make these toilets, um, that also install at an angle like that too. And that was really interesting for me. Cause I'm in Canada, I'm kind of considering a, a, um,
Speaker: changing around the bathroom at this cabin that my parents have to a much smaller bathroom. So it's good to know kind of like how small you can go and still fit a toilet in there. Yeah. So our house is built in 1977. Hasn't seen a lot of remodeling. So in short, we're doing like a full remodel to update it to 2023, 2024 standards, but also put a good artistic twist on it with what we can, but nothing crazy custom I'd say.
Speaker: Yeah, and I guess a good signal from when we were chatting with Fumi last night after the contractors left that like, yeah, you know, it did seem to me as well, and she mentioned this, that like a lot of like reform or like renovated homes here, they all kind of sort of follow a cookie cutter pattern. And she did say that Japanese people are looking for something a little bit more unique. That's definitely what we're trying to do. So good signal there.
Speaker: Yeah. I feel confident. One of the big differences between doing renovations here versus using Japanese contractors, they do seem
Speaker: maybe more reliable, maybe I'm speaking too early here, definitely, but I can tell they take the job seriously and let's go ahead and jump into it. So we had two contractor kind of bids come by both yesterday and the day before. The first one was kind of a smaller, more independent company. We got this guy's contact through a friend of a friend. So there's a level of referral there that I think is feels good. And the second company is a larger,
Speaker: That last referral step was from like another independent contractor, this Australian guy. So it's like a contractor recommending another contractor.
Speaker: Yep. And then the second company is a little bit larger of a company. I think they probably have more resources. This is kind of their bread and butter. And I feel confident they could definitely do it. The one thing we'll discuss a little bit later is they wanted to take more of the cookie cutter route, definitely. So it's a consideration we, we definitely have to take, but we learned a tremendous amount. I'd say from both, both groups, right, Joey?
Speaker: Yeah, both of them, um, had some, had some great points. Um, in terms of like, I feel like new stuff I learned, I definitely learned a lot more about the house and, you know, sort of the process of renovating a house in Japan in Bepu through the second group. They told us, um, yeah, about like free tests we can have done by the city for like earthquake stability. Um, and like the, they talked about the, the earthquake rebuilding process, et cetera.
Speaker: So for simplicity sake, we're going to say contractor a was a small independent guy. Contractor B is the larger company. Um, and just kind of compare and contrast. I think it'll be easier than saying there, I don't even know the names of the second group, right? We didn't get that.
Speaker: Like AK or something like that. I don't know. Yeah, I don't even remember the names. Contractor A, contractor B. So in both processes, overarching theme was like, wow, they are very serious about these quotes. They were here for, I'd say like two hours. Right, Joey? About two hours. I was kind of tired, but I noticed I saw you were tired too. You like went to a different room for a bit.
Speaker: Um, so first off, the Fumi had organized these guys. Um, they were early or if not like minutes on time. So very, very punctual. So that's a huge plus they were, they were ready to go and they're very serious and prepared for this, which, uh, feels, feels good. You know, you're handing over your house to someone. Um,
Speaker: Second, they measured everything. They literally spent at least 50 % of the time measuring, taking photos, and really trying to document, which is another huge plus. I've had contractors in the US who are just like,
Speaker: Yeah, it looks good, you know, and throws out a random number and you're like, what, how the hell did you do that? So, Joey, what were your, anything else? Yeah. I do feel like, yeah, like all those measurements they took, that kind of stuff, you know, that's all got to be for them to just like figure out the quote. You know, I feel like they're going to be like, they're going to have a reason for every number they give us. Like, Oh, you know, labor, like material, like every number they give us, I feel like they're going to be able to back that up with whatever data they gathered when they were here.
Speaker: Totally. They're going to work really hard on that quote, at least I think. Or there's some methodology, which in the U S definitely gets lost. You know, there's kind of like, Oh, we're not quite sure labor, labor costs going up material costs. So I think they'll be very like line by line. This is what it is. And I appreciate that a lot. Yeah, that's going to be cool to see. Um, all right. So let's go contractor one. Uh, what were your impressions? What were, what were some of the things he said that kind of
Speaker: Yeah, so I preferred Contractor 1. I believe Takei, you did as well. Contractor 1, seeing, I don't know, I felt like just with him in the room, it was like a different atmosphere from the second one. So I'd like just first off, Contractor 1, he like, I don't know, felt like a friendlier atmosphere with him in the house, first of all. I don't know, maybe he was like a very smiley guy or something.
Speaker: But he yeah, he told us we had good sense And I think just like the fact that he You know more independent contractor I think he's more used to doing custom jobs and like obviously we have two rooms that highly customized in our like For our design here and like we want I feel like both of those rooms We really want to have a do a good job there
Speaker: I feel like this guy will see that vision and do his best to realize that vision.
Speaker: Yeah, I'd say plus, plus a hundred. I liked the first contractor more. Um, that was our first experience actually seeing the Japanese contractor give us a quote. So he was really, I was impressed by how detail oriented he was. Um, so Fumi and him, I think probably spoke straight two hours, you know, it was, it was very, uh, I think very reasonable communications. Um, yeah, overall, he seemed more down to do the small job, which I appreciate.
Speaker: F we'll, yeah, we'll, we'll talk about the earthquake stuff. That's more relevant to the second group of contractors, but just now looking back in retrospect about contractor a still, he didn't bring any of that stuff up. Totally. Yep. So that's the negative looking back on it, but, um,
Speaker: He seemed excited about the job, which I think is kind of the X factor that is probably going to convince me again. We haven't seen the quotes and the costs, but, um, yeah, given he's a smaller, smaller guy, kind of more interested and he gave us that compliment, you know, I did like him, but now let's move on to contractor B, uh, the big boys, Joey, what are your thoughts on them?
Speaker: Again, I can't explain it, but the atmosphere was a little bit different. It didn't feel as friendly or maybe they weren't as smiley as the first guy. I can't explain it, but as soon as they walked in the house, I was like, oh man, this is going to be a long two hours. For some reason, I felt that way.
Speaker: They were good. They were very professional. I think Tagay mentioned this early on. Both of these contractors seemed very capable of completing the job. Both groups and the second guys too gave a very serious impression. They also spent a long time measuring. So this was two people. Contractor A was just one person's. Contractor B was two people.
Speaker: Um, they helped out. I, we had a broken door recently and they like gave us some tape to fix it up, which was kind of a nice gesture. He kind of like, I can't remember how he said it, but he kind of said something. He was like, yo, you guys got to tape that up. Like, what are you doing living with broken glass everywhere? Um, he was like, you amateurs.
Speaker: He has a good point he's a very good point I was yeah very good point so I would say very very quickly wrapping up my thoughts They also brought up a lot of the earthquake stuff, which I thought was good. We can talk about that again after wrapping up our thoughts on the two contractors, but I
Speaker: Yeah, earthquake stuff they brought up, they seem very capable and knowledgeable of handling the earthquake stuff. I would say that was definitely a positive for me, you know, we want this place to be safe. The biggest negative that I saw was that they really wanted to, they were pushed, they kind of pushed in a few different places for like cookie cutter solutions.
Speaker: Um, and we kind of told them how, like, for, uh, we, especially during the, um, when we were talking about the shower room, they really kept pushing back. They wanted to put in like the hostel style, like shower, uh, unit kind of thing. And then prefabs, prefabs. Yeah. I vetoed that. And then they're like, okay, well, what about like curbed shower with like shower curtain? And then.
Speaker: You know, it just kept going. And then I would, I could hear in the conversation he'd bring, he kept saying like, you need to again, like the prefab unit. And like, he really kept bringing it back up, um, which shows, you know, kind of shows what they're comfortable doing. Um, kind of how they run their business. Um, definitely they, they pushed for more of a cookie cutter solution. They are a big company, so maybe it's more of a numbers thing for them.
Speaker: Yeah. I mean, you guys, first off, good job standing your ground, Joey. I think I was there and he was like, we want to put the prefab in. And we're like, Joey's like, Nope, not going to do it. I need the concrete dream and I'm supportive. So good job, uh, standing up to the bully there. Even the second guy came in, the more boss guy came in for a second there. He like did some measurements. He was like, you know what? This bathroom is the perfect size for prefab. Okay. It doesn't matter to me. I don't want it.
Speaker: Yeah. I mean, I totally echo your thoughts there, Joey. The second guy is very, very capable. I'm sure they could do it. They could do it very, they actually had said we could do this in a month. We're sorry. It takes so long. We're like, whoa, month is a pretty dang fast. Um, but to your point, yeah, good points. They, they can do the job. They're on time. They're very communicative. Um, they did point out those
Speaker: earthquake considerations and kind of like how to get around it. Uh, but Fumi actually made up another point that they might be incentivized to do so because I think they have, because they're a bigger company, they're working with the city to make sure things are more earthquake safe. So there's maybe a kickback there. Don't quote me on it, but we do suspect that, you know, there's something there and they're incentivized to do that. Obviously. Yeah, a little too convenient for them. And then the cons, uh, totally agree with you. They walked in and they weren't.
Speaker: stoked about what we were doing. I'd say like, they're like, he's these foreigners. They want to, they want to do something different. Maybe a little bit. Some of our ideas are, are definitely high impact. We like to call them, um, but important, let's say for the design of a unique house. So they were not, um, they were not supportive and I understand bigger company. They want to do those prefab, just what they're used to, which is that, you know, there's a time and place for that. Right.
Speaker: Yeah, definitely. Um, not for, not for us right now though. Not enough for us. So overall contractor, a, um, I think both of us speaking for both of us, Joey, we preferred contractor, right? Definitely.
Speaker: And we're waiting on the prices. So they both came to give quotes two days ago and one yesterday. So we suspect it'll take about a week to get the proper quote. Again, they took a ton of measurements and we'll have another episode when we reveal the quote price. But as now, if we had to pick and prices are equal, contractor A is probably our go -to given the smaller, more custom nature of what we're trying to do.
Speaker: Um, yeah. So Joey, what are the big, let's say big three takeaways here? You know, we, we spent basically four hours talking with these folks. Um, if you were to recommend someone listening or for us to even recommend to us, if we were to do it again, what would, what'd be the big takeaways?
Speaker: Yeah, well, without seeing the price yet, you know, so I don't know if we need to temper our expectations, which kind of have a feeling we might, but without knowing the price. Some takeaways are that, yeah, older homes, earthquake stuff is a true consideration. You might have to upgrade your home.
Speaker: I was just off of that earthquake thing. Something we did learn takeaway is the city has a program to incentivize new bills to be earthquake ready. So our fixer Fumi is going to be reaching out to the city. There's like a free consultation where they'll bring someone out here and, and they'll kind of give us advice for free, quote unquote. Um, and the, also the government has like some pot of money every year allotted to fixing up houses. So there's a chance that we can get, I think for me it said like,
Speaker: 7 ,000 to 8 ,000 US dollars from the city, maybe, to go towards that construction, which is a pretty good pro tip.
Speaker: Yeah, um, earthquake stuff. Uh, yeah. And I guess, I guess another kind of funny thing that happened related to earthquake stuff is, um, we busted down some walls downstairs already. And there's like this strange, like diagonal board, but it was like really loose. Like it was like a real two by four. It was a two by four at a diagonal in between like two kind of wooden pillars.
Speaker: And, but it was really loose. So we took down the wall and I was like, all right, nothing structural is going to be loose or like, you know, it didn't feel structural. So took it out. And then we learned from contractors number two, that that's, uh, that it's not structural, but it's there in case of earthquakes, it prevents like the house from like stretching and skewing and swaying in that lateral direction.
Speaker: that the diagonal is in so it's like a earthquake damage prevention strategy, not necessarily keeping up the house. So anyways, yeah, I'm probably going to have to put that back. That's hilarious, Joey. He was saying that and we were just both listening and then I looked at you like, oh shit, Joey, we took that cross beam out.
Speaker: Should we tell them? Yeah. Yeah, that's funny. So another takeaway is like Japanese homes and you know, with the like the sort of holes we put in the floor and the walls and stuff like that, like Japanese, these older Japanese homes, they are built different. They're built with like, sometimes it feels like cheap, a lot cheaper materials, especially the floors here. Like there's these earthquake bracing things in the walls that I never can see. You know, we don't have that problem in Nova Scotia. So like, you know, they are, they are built a little bit different, which is interesting.
Speaker: Yeah. I'd say take away two, um, having documents ready, uh, they kept asking for this thing called a Tokibo. I still don't fully understand what it is, but it is something issued when you buy the house that is like states the age of the house or maybe a layout or blueprint. Uh, what's your interpretation of that, Joey? Let me try to open it as we speak and I'll tell you what's in it. If I can read it, but, uh, another document.
Speaker: can be show we've heard the title. So we're, we're talking to Ziv just to get those. It sounds like we're definitely getting them, but something for prioritize. There's like getting the title in hand paper wise and also that tool keyboard before maybe starting some of these things is not a bad idea, but totally okay too. Yeah, they did want to see documents. Um, I'm not seeing anything with like a layout, but a lot of like,
Speaker: When the house was built, how many floors, that kind of stuff. I guess the third thing I learned is cultural, how to greet Japanese contractors. Fumi killed it. Me and Joey were just loafing around. But our entrance way, our slippers weren't organized. Fumi helped us culturally greet these contractors. And I think that's a big X factor here in that.
Speaker: If it was just me and Joey, that interaction would be a lot, there would be so much more friction that I think it was really, really helpful to have Fumi kind of be our front man and talking to them and translating for us.
Speaker: Yeah. I mean, just even from their perspective, right? Like culturally, there's a lot of unknowns for them. Like how are we going to behave as their, as their clients? Right. Like, um, so it's nice that we had Fumi there. They feel like probably that they, they understand it's going to be like any other process to them kind of thing. It's not going to be such a wild card now. Yeah. So those are three big takeaways. I think it was, it was huge though. That was a big milestone for us, Joey, too.
Speaker: talk to our contractors. The good thing is everyone sounded like it was doable. They had both kind of given timeframes about like one or two months, it seems like. Um, which is, I think so fast. Yeah, that's great. It'll be done before we get back.
Speaker: Like a second trip. Yeah, so I'm headed to Tokyo. Both of us are headed to Tokyo tomorrow. I'm heading back to the States. Joey's going to come back and hold down the fort here. We're going to reconvene close to the end of November back in Bepu to hopefully, we'll see what happens then, but probably going to be meeting with the contractor, picking out finishes, things like that.
Speaker: Joey, the final question for you. We have contractor A, contractor B, what is your prediction on price? You can do yen and then we'll convert it to US dollars.
Speaker: Yeah. So, uh, I've never gone through this process before, like either in Japan or America. So again, this is me, um, kind of like just guessing. Um, but based on the, here's what I do. Here's the hints that I have is that, uh, you know, the price of the house, we bought it for 40.
Speaker: 6 million yen, um, about $42 ,000 US at that time and still is. Um, so I know the price of the house and also for a few different things, specific things in the house, they gave us estimates. Like I thought that they said, um, like around $2 ,000. I can't remember the price in yen, but maybe like two to $3 ,000 for the, uh, holy Kotatsu. So like the big banquet style sunken table.
Speaker: I thought I had one more price from the contractor a maybe I don't but I For some reason the feeling is that I had two pieces of two observations like that We're like, oh, I didn't think that the price that they threw out was that bad
Speaker: Um, so that being said, I am hopeful that the price will be, um, I guess close to the price that we paid for the house or a little bit, or a little bit higher. So I'm going to guess again. Uh, so maybe like 6 million to 8 million yen, which is going to be what, 40 to 60 K ish.
Speaker: Um, that's sort of what I'm hoping for. And, uh, uh, like, oh, and the other piece of data is what I know that, uh, you've been paying in like Hawaii or wherever your rentals are for contractors. And I'm guessing it's going to be less than that. So I believe you said like a hundred K or so. So less than that. Um, and just, yeah, so I'm thinking in between what you would pay in America and the price of our house is, I guess, sort of where I'm landing for a next, uh, a guess.
Speaker: All right, spit out a number for contractor A and contractor B. Just, uh, okay. So 6 million, 6 million yen contractor A. So basically what we pay for the house, um, $40 ,000 contractor B eight. Yeah.
Speaker: Probably they they kind of kept saying well, this is expensive job big job like they kind of kept saying that kind of stuff so 8 million to maybe 100 million yen No 10 million yen Yeah, I don't know what that is in dollars a little more than 40k 60k that's 70 closer to closer 60 70k
Speaker: My prediction is pretty in line with yours actually Joey. So for contract A, I would bet it's going to be like 40 to 50K USD about what we paid for our house plus more. Also, there's going to be like an extra consideration of furnishing, things like that. The second people are definitely more expensive. So I agree with you probably closer to the 70 to 80K.
Speaker: This, we go back and forth, the yen to dollar, the dollar is so strong compared to the, compared to the yen right now where these costs in the U S I wouldn't blink an eye. Um, I've been doing renovations in Hawaii and in California and it's just like, I feel like I'm getting gouged. So even if we do this and they do it well and they do it without too much problems, I feel good. It's a lot more than we expected to pay Joey, but I think.
Speaker: They also kind of have a pay over time here. So I think it's 50 % upfront, 50 % of when the job is done. Uh, me and Joey are considering getting jobs again to hopefully fund this, but, um, let's see how it goes. Jerry's still there.
Speaker: Still here. Yeah. I mean, just kind of thinking in my own thoughts. Final thoughts of a version zero, uh, trip number one overall, I think just eat them. That's a congratulations in Serbian, learned that at the Serbian wedding we went to just eat them version zero is complete. Pretty excited about that. Uh, I feel like I could live here for another month. No problem.
Speaker: All right, I'm a little jealous of you, but unfortunately our one month together has come to an end. It's been a great, it's been a great time. Yeah. Great trip.
