[aikinai]

Your first point is true I think.

Your second is certainly not. The baseline expectation for Japanese homes is constantly improving and something built cheap today is many times better than something built cheap 20 years ago.

Yeah, you get a 30 year loan, but that’s standard. Where do people not do that to afford housing?

[makeitdouble]

On baseline expectations, there's two different standards: the one when you build/buy your primary residency, and the other when it's for rent. In most countries there's not that much of a gap, in Japan I see it as way wider.

Also, appartments can have a very solid foundation cleanly matching mandated standards and very cheap resident rooms with paper thin walls and poor insulation. On paper they will be better homes (free internet, air conditionning, automated bathtub etc), in practice the difference will be less obvious.

On 30y loans, it's fine if you are a full fledged employee of a well regarded company. It's another story if you're a contractor (roughly half of the active population! [0]), and impossible as part timer.

[0] https://www.sangyo-rodo.metro.tokyo.lg.jp/toukei/koyou/ed6fc...