Government may introduce notification requirements for foreign buyers of sensitive land
The government is considering introducing legislation that would require advance notice to be submitted when a foreign national is purchasing land in or nearby areas considered to be of national importance. The draft bill is expected to be submitted to parliament sometime this year.
New guidelines to define stigmatized properties
The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT) is planning to create clear guidelines regarding the sale and rent of stigmatized properties. Currently, confusion and uncertainty about what is and isn’t a psychological impact have led to numerous disputes between tenants and landlords.
Compliance rules relaxed for house-to-commercial conversions
On June 25, 2019, the Building Standards Act was revised. One of the interesting revisions was regarding the requirements that must be met when changing the use of an existing property.
Proposed law could allow the forced sale of abandoned land
On February 22, the Cabinet approved a bill that will allow land with unidentifiable owners to be forcibly sold off by a court-appointed trustee, thereby helping to free up some of the vast swaths of idle land across the country with missing owners.
New minpaku laws decidedly unpopular in Kyoto City
As at the end of August 2018, Kyoto City had only received 129 applications for short-term letting under the new minpaku laws that were introduced in June. Of those, 33 are located in exclusive residential zones where properties can only be rented out to guests for a maximum of 60 nights between January 15 and March 15, with some exceptions allowed for traditional machiya townhouses and homes where the host also lives on the premises. This pales in comparison to the total number of 7,028 applications made nationwide. In Kyoto Prefecture, excluding Kyoto City, only 18 applications have been received as at September 14.