A beautiful, sunny day here in Melbourne with perfect temps around 28C and light winds. A perfect summer day!!!!
So in consideration of it being winter in Japan, let’s head north to Hokkaido for a few properties.
Hokkaido is beautiful in summer and fall and I really like the place. Sapporo, though, is a little ‘small’ and maybe a little boring if you are from one of the bigger cities such as Tokyo or Yokohama and stay there for any extended period of time!!
First up is a really interesting property located across from Maruyama Park/Hokkaido Shrine and short walk from the Maruyama Park Subway station. This area is very nice and 4 stops from the center of Sapporo. The price is 1,650万円.
https://www.athome.co.jp/mansion/108358 ... ist_simple
The building is a low rise type of only three floors and has a huge 130 square meters of area. There is a balcony, but unfortunately it is so small as to be basically non-existent and I didn’t see any outside garden or terrace for the unit despite being on the ground floor.
The ‘mansion’ does come with its own sauna though for those nice cold Sapporo temps.!! Don’t know if you could afford to turn it on though……..
It also has a 風除室 to keep out the cold, but the kitchen is basically worthless. It doesn’t match the rest of the unit.
And now for the shocker, which is as I have stated, one of the biggest reasons not to buy one of these types of properties in Japan…………
If you bought one of the units in this complex, be prepared to go to the poor house as the fees will kill you. The 管理費等 comes in at a whopping 37,730円 per month to which you have to add another 32,500円 a month for the 修繕積立金, but you are not out of the woods yet. A parking space will set you back 20,000円 a month.
So just under 70,000 yen for the basic fees per month; 90,000 if you want to park your car there.
Ouch. Double Ouch!!
There was a unit in this building for sale way back in 2011, but I’m not sure if this is the same one.
(The web site doesn’t let me download photos so you’ll have to check them out there.)
So great location in a nice area and a big living space, at a reasonable price, but all those good points totally wiped out because of the huge carrying costs.
The next property is in/near the nice little city of Otaru.
https://www.athome.co.jp/mansion/696254 ... ist_simple
For the price of 798万円 or less than half of the previous property you can buy yourself 106.48m² of space.
Unfortunately, the property is smack dab in the middle between two train stations, so it is quite inconvenient from that point.
Fees are more ‘reasonable’ at 15,000円 for the 管理費等 and 修繕積立金 at 4,900円. (Way too low!!) Other fees are 共用電気代(およそ)2,600円、町内会費(年間)4,800円. So you’ll get hit with those as well. Parking is 8,000円/月.
The kitchen is a little small, but much better than the above property and has an unusual feature of having a balcony access. From the photos it appears that there might be an oven in the unit.
The unit has a nice ‘ocean view’, but is located next to the Ororon Line and then further down towards the ocean is the main train line so there might be some noise. It appears that the building the unit is in is elevated so there may or may not be a tsunami rick depending on the numbers.
Lot's of space for a reasonable price - a nice little holiday apartment in Hokkaido?