A house in the snow country, on terms & you can read.
Yuki no Kuni is an independent index of every municipal akiya bank in northern Japan, translated into plain English, with the original source link still attached. 63 properties, twelve prefectures, prices from ¥100.
no Kuni
A vacant house with 48㎡ of building area in Fukuoka.
Property 80127 in Itoshima
I built this index because I couldn't find one. The houses already exist. The municipal akiya banks already exist. What didn't exist — until I sat down and started indexing them — was a single place where a foreigner could read them, walk away with the original source link in hand, and decide for themselves.
I am not a realtor. I do not take a cut. The index will be free, forever. The subscription pays for the parts that take real work: weekly translated briefings, municipal-grant tracking, and — when the time comes — a person on the ground who can stand in the snow with you.
6 entries, chosen by hand. The full archive holds 57 more.
Property 80127 in Itoshima
¥20.0M askingListed via the municipal akiya bank. Direct source link on the listing page.
A330│1階は車庫・倉庫 飯山地区の3階建8DK中古住宅
¥12.8M askingListed via the municipal akiya bank. Direct source link on the listing page.
A331│田・畑付き 外様地区の6DK中古住宅
¥3.2M askingListed via the municipal akiya bank. Direct source link on the listing page.
柳町仲区4番地2の空き家
¥7.8M askingListed via the municipal akiya bank. Direct source link on the listing page.
A333│別棟物置・車庫付き 秋津地区の7DK中古住宅
¥16.0M askingListed via the municipal akiya bank. Direct source link on the listing page.
A336│常盤地区の8SSDK中古住宅
¥4.0M askingListed via the municipal akiya bank. Direct source link on the listing page.
Browse free, forever. Subscribe when it gets serious.
The index will always be free to use. Pay only for the parts that take a person — translations, briefings, viewings, and the introductions you cannot make cold.
For anyone curious about Japan's snow country and the houses inside it.
- Browse all 63 listings
- Save up to ten favourites
- Direct links to source pages
- Weekly Saturday newsletter
For buyers actively researching the move, not yet on the plane.
- Everything in Explorer
- Unlimited saved listings
- Full English translations of every listing
- Weekly regional briefings
- Municipal renovation-grant tracker
- Price-history charts
For buyers who need a person on the ground — translator, scout, fixer.
- Everything in Insider
- Introductions to vetted realtors
- On-the-ground viewing reports
- Translator on inspection day
- End-to-end paperwork support
- Priority email line to Evan
Six places we cover. What is different about each.
The northernmost island. ¥100 houses, Niseko's foreign-investment zone, and three hundred and fifty centimetres of annual snowfall.
Mountains, ski resorts, the densest set of municipal akiya banks in the country. Ninety minutes from Tokyo by Shinkansen.
Onsen towns, samurai districts, the slowest depopulation curve in Tohoku. The houses are cheap because nobody is competing.
Sake, rice, the Sea of Japan coastline. Echigo-Yuzawa is two hours from Tokyo. The countryside, half that.
Cherries, hot springs, and Ginzan Onsen. Quietest prefecture in the index. Buying here means meaning it.
Takayama, Shirakawago, the Hida valley. Machiya in the old quarters, kominka in the foothills. Foreign-buyer-friendly municipal offices.
We had circled Japan-property videos on YouTube for two years. Yuki no Kuni was the first thing that let us actually read a listing, then sent us the contact details for the town office without trying to sell us anything. We closed on a kominka in Iiyama eight months later.
Four things worth reading before you fly out.
The five legal steps every foreign buyer asks about — and the order they actually happen in.
Visa status, juminhyo registration, hanko, gas inspection, the day you get the keys. With the forms you'll need and what they cost.
再建築不可: the one zoning term you cannot afford to miss.
A plain-English explanation of "no rebuild" zoning, why it makes the price look attractive, and the four ways it limits what you can actually do.
What ¥4 million actually buys you in 2026, in five different prefectures.
Side-by-side notes from five recent purchases at the same price point. What you give up. What you get. What surprised us about each.
The carpenter who restores akiya in Iiyama, and what he charges.
Eight years of kominka restoration in northern Nagano, in his own words. With the rate sheet he agreed to publish.
The houses are real. So is the catch — which is why this site exists.
Start with the free index. Subscribe when it gets serious. Bring us in when there is a key on the table.