Conditions for choosing a house

　There are two main options when trying to acquire a house in Japan, either in the suburbs or in the city. If the 23 wards of Tokyo are the largest urban areas, local cities in the Greater Tokyo Area such as Kawasaki City, Yokohama City, and Chiba City exist as the next urban areas, each one with their suburbs. The suburbs of Tokyo's 23 wards extend along the prefectural borders in residential areas such as Setagaya and Edogawa, as well as across the Tama River, Edo River, and Arakawa. And each district along Kawasaki City, Yokohama City, Kawagoe, Urawa, Koshigaya, etc. along the railroad lines that extend radially from Tokyo, along Ichikawa City, Funabashi City, etc. Also, each suburb exists as an adjacent municipality beyond the local city

　It starts looking for a property to purchase a house from Tokyo if the people who are working in the 23 wards area of it. They seek for a newly built apartment such as tower condos or a detached house, but to purchase a big enough property, it would cost them over 50 million yen, and if it is a land, the average price is 600,000 yen/m2, becoming a very expensive choice. Therefore, they look for a second-hand house, but because the price difference when comparing with the new construction is not so attractive, they head outside of Tokyo’s 23 wards as the next possibility. Stations along the Tokyu Line, Tobu Line, JR Tokaido Line, JR Sobu Line, JR Takasaki Line, and JR Joban Line are listed as candidates, and the property price will increase or decrease depending on whether you can use high-speed trains or how far away from the station. In the 1970s and 1980s, there were people who were working in Tokyo, were looking for their houses in the suburbs of satellite cities of Tokyo because it was too expensive to purchase their property even along these lines. However, due to the excessive supply of large-scale collective housing, excess of housing stock, increasing of residential lots or old houses, declining birthrate and increasing aging population, declining mortgage interest rates, etc., it makes people no longer difficult to have their houses inside of Tokyo and them possible to have their houses at the suburb where is closer to their works offices.

　From this choice of housing price and distance to the workplace, conveniences such as ample facilities or an external space generous enough to have a garden, from the choice of an apartment house or detached house, it will settle down to a property that suits the situation.

　At this time, when thinking of buying a house, depending on whether you are younger or older, the conditions that come after the budget will change. Of course, because there are individual circumstances, it is only possible to talk about it in general. However, what young people want in their surrounding environment depends on whether they have children or not. If there are no children, it is relevant whether the supermarket is open until late at night for a working couple, is easy to eat out, or has smooth access to cultural facilities and shopping places on holidays, etc. However, the conditions for the daytime of weekdays environments and facilities for children such as elementary schools and kindergartens are less relevant. The first thing to think when considering having children is looking at moving to a larger property even if it means selling a house, so whether it is a location or new construction, the ease of sale in 5-10 years will be an essential requirement.

　Getting married in their 30s is getting more and more common nowadays, so they think of buying a house in a situation where they have worked long since they graduated from university. Therefore, the standard for deciding the house is different from that in their 20's because there is also the reference to commuting from the place where they already live, the satisfaction and dissatisfaction with the surrounding environment, etc. On the other hand, the situation is different for families with more than one child and no plans to increase. In many cases, the security and the atmosphere of a child's school, educational environment, or playground are important criteria. Also, the place where you can go out on Saturdays and Sundays is a place that can be enjoyed not only by adults but also by children, and it is also important to be able to find grocery items in shops such as supermarkets at a reasonable price. Eating out on weekdays will be less often, so the detached house comes to be the candidate which can be closer to nature, parks, large supermarkets, etc. rather than a property near a station where restaurants are nearby. Also, since there is a tendency that they do not want to spend much money on the house because they already have expenses raising and supporting their children, the price becomes quite a critical condition, not only the condition and location of the house. Consequently, households that wanted at first apartment buildings will seek new tower condominiums that are a little far from the city center by making a trade-off between price and floor space.

　These are typical examples of young couples looking for a new house, but there are also cases where older people seek one. Until then, there was a tacit understanding that once someone decided to buy the house, it would be their final residence and it would not change until they passed away, but this was inevitably due to family work and social habits, etc. However, now, the house connects to nothing after the owners finish their career because they have no family business and even the eldest son or the only child they would leave the house and find a job in another city. For this reason, new conditions for the elders come out, such as moving to live at a nursing home or with their son. Even though not having a large percentage, one trend is migrating to the countryside. It is an option to leave the wasteful urban area, move to the countryside with a large garden and spend a time for working their garden farm and a rich nature every day and, since there is no daily work or housework, they will find a place that suits their preferences without worrying about convenience and surrounding facilities.

　Considering not only the pattern in this situation, but also from a marketing point of view, it seems that dividing into two groups is also meaningful in considering how to choose the house.

　There is an idea of an early adopter and a follower, and the house purchasing process is similar to this, having two profiles: the place-decided and the real estate portal site one. The former is a group that wants to live in a specific area, station, or town with longing and connection, something special, and has already decided where to live and the image of life they want for themselves. For example, in Tokyo, people who dreamed of living in Kichijoji and Ogikubo(one of hip area for younger generation) looking for a culturally appropriate trend and a sense of distance from the city center or wanted the status of living in Roppongi Hills, the previous entrepreneurs are easy to understand. This is by no means limited to popular cities and buildings, and people who think that the local area where they were born and raised is needed to participate in a festival at a local shrine and to belong to a community.

　In contrast, the latter is a group that searches for a house by setting conditions on a real estate portal site, such as “near station”, “3LDK(three bed rooms with living room, dining room and kitchen)”, “new built”, “hole electric system”, and can be seen as a reasonable type that makes decisions while finding a compromise with very flexibly. However, this condition setting also plays a role as a popular barometer, so the quality setting such as attractive ones that do not fit the condition tend to be ignored, because the closeness to a station with a high-speed line beats the tower apartment built in the middle of the rice field, because the price is cheaper than the market price, so they will buy a lot of detached houses that can only be accessed through narrow roads created by cutting through the forest.

　There are many of the latter group living in emerging residential areas, so it is possible to imagine that the current Kougaidanchi may be the appearance of those who are buying like them 30 years later. Besides, people who live in Kougaidanchi that have been abandoned and have created the place are also considered to be of the same type.

Kougaidanchi with the border of one hour

　The factor of distance to the workplace seems to have a massive impact on this housing decision process. Considering the case of working in Tokyo, many people travel to and from their homes by public transportation such as buses and trains. Basically, there are many companies that start from around 8:30/9:00 and close at around 17:00/17:30. Distance to work means how much time you have to endure this rush. How long it takes to pass through the card reader at your workplace after leaving the door of your house is considered as mental commute time, and it will be considered taking into account convenience such as transit connections when deciding to buy the house.

　Picking up this Kougaidanchi near Tokyo from satellite photos, It seems that there is one big border that does not exceed 1 hour concerning the distance to the workplace when choosing it from considering the popularity in the current real estate market, the trends of people who bought a house and my own feeling, etc. And to be clear, this is not the time to get on public transportation, but the actual commuting time, which is said to be door-to-door. Whether this time exceeds 1h, I think it is the difference between the rise and fall of Kougaidanchi. In other words, for those who go to Tokyo 23 wards and other local cities, Kougaidanchi where people can get to the workplace in 1h are likely to survive, and those that do not are likely to lose their land prices in the future. According to my hypothesis, this “1-hour boundary” is likely to be especially true for those who commute using public transportation, and for those who commute by car, a “30 minutes border” would be assumed. This can be attributed to the fact that frustration tends to accumulate while cars are commuting due to traffic jams, and that driving is more stressful than using public transport.

　The 1h border is considered to have a significant impact on the factors when deciding to buy a house, but it is assumed that it does not influence only a commute. In terms of distance, it will have an impact on important destinations for hobbies, friends, parents, and others. For example, if you work in Yokohama, but your hobby is surfing, you can buy a house in Chigasaki, and the location that you can access within 1h for what you cherish in life is called the living area. It seems that it is a sense of distance that can be incorporated into the region to which it belongs and identifies that forms itself when thinking about it. This can be supported by rules of thumb, such as the fact that areas beyond 1h are not called hometown when they consider their birthplace. The declining Kougaidanchi affected by the 1 hour border, it probably would have to do something. If it is necessary to prolong their life, it has to make them rebirth, and if it is determined that it is no longer necessary, and who will judge is another matter, a declaration of the scheduled termination should be issued, and the situation of people who live there would need to be remediated.

　Prolonging their life would require a certain amount of money, so the government would need to have a perspective that they would increase in the future and that the number of residents or industry will also enhance and expect tax revenues. Kougaidanchi that are currently hindered by the 1 hour border is basically too far away from the current industry so, considering the current situation, it will be inevitable to judge them as an unnecessary place. However, there are certain people's lives there, the memories of those who moved with hope remain as a dream home where allotments were purchased, lined with houses that wrapped warm and happy families. Under the current haphazard situation, where the value of such innocent people's valuable assets is reduced under the guise of urban planning, while at the same time continuing to issue development permits, it is obvious that in another 20 years there will be a large supply of the same unwanted used houses on the market, and there will be nothing more that can be done about it. And it is going to be out of control. It's already been anyway.

　When thinking so, it’s not bad to look back on the current situation in Japan and make a judgment on the Kougaidanchi, assuming what the next industry, the near future, or the distant future should be. For example, if Japan does not officially accept immigrants as it is now, the labor force and international competitiveness will decline. It's been a long time since the country became a service industry, already away from the manufacturing powerhouse of the secondary industries. For example, could the primary industry be reconsidered as the world population increases and competition intensifies? Since people must continue to supply nutrition, even if there is a future where supplements will replace meals, an industry that creates the nutrition source will be still necessary. They are currently around abandoned farmlands and abandoned mountainous suburbs, but when Japan's population declines and large amounts of food are no longer needed, the location of the Kougaidanchi is very convenient for the new primary industry. Isn't it a good place? Maybe people who were born and raised in the current urban area may be more comfortable with a style of commuting to work from an ordinary house than a place that looks like a farmer's old house. Perhaps people might not have to do a lot of work because AI can do many tasks on their behalf. Then, you may not have to go to the workplace on a crowded train, and video chat will evolve and you will be able to stay there if you use VR and MR. This can also reduce the need to be near or directly connected to travel or popular places at the same time so that the negative effects of physical dislocation, substantial environmental friendliness, adverse effects of too high density might no longer exist and the attractiveness of the suburbs will be relatively increased. The remaining bottleneck is a spiritual part like the brand value of the land, and if the pride that belongs to the land can be removed without difficulty, there may be a day when you can decide to buy a house or real estate just by its size and price, just like a service of online price comparison.

Each city and the border of one hour

　Here I tried to illustrate the 1 hour border from each city using the Google maps route search function*. As you can see, the range of 1h will not change much in terms of the distance that can be moved if you travel on a public transport vehicle at a speed of about 80-100 km/h. It can be seen that the larger the city, the more possible routes you can choose. The fact that there are many options to commute within 1h does not seem to have much relation to practical life.

　For example, if you live in Chiyoda Ward or Chuo Ward around Tokyo Station, you wouldn't have to go to Tokorozawa, Hachioji, or Kashiwa on a daily basis. You would only need to move within the ward you live in or its near area and go out at the time of longer holidays, etc. In that case, they would go beyond the 1h border to a tourist spot or a place rich in nature. Considering this, the range of 1h can be thought as the range where people commuting to the working place can live. In other words, the city has the potential to acquire so many human resources, and this can be seen in the population estimation of each city in the future. It shows that there are areas where the 1h border of each city overlaps and areas that belong only to that city. These overlapping areas have potential as a suburb of either city and will continue to maintain their value as Japan decreases in population due to the declining birthrate and aging population.

　If you look more specifically, there is a station called Toke in Chiba City, for example. There is a luxury residential area called One Hundred Hills (It came from Beverly hills of course.), which was originally an out of league for the local residents. However, at present, the land prices have fallen and the situation is not expected to develop much. However, recently land prices have fallen and there is no prospect that the situation will improve much. Yet, in this area that is two stations closer to Tokyo, near Kamatori Station, the land price is kept and may not develop tremendously, but there is no sign of decline. This may be due to the fact that Kamatori takes 50 minutes by train to Tokyo, while Toke takes 1 hour. In other words, if you run out of 1 hour on the train, you will spend over 1 hour from home to your office. If it takes less than an hour by train, it will take about an hour if you add the approximate time from the house to the station and from the station to the company. There seems to be a big psychological gap in whether it fits in this one hour frame.

　Then how is the situation of Yoshinodai-danchi going? It’s sharply declining and their land prices have been 10 times lesser than from the highest already. The nearest station of that area is Umatate of Kominato railway(It is a local train that comes each hour) with no parking lot, It makes people use bikes for commute. It takes at least 20 minutes from the area to the station on the. If you use the shortcuts as off-road roots, it’s shortened by 5 minutes. It takes an hour and a half from Umatatei Station to Tokyo Station, even with a good transfer. Even so, several of the current residents of the complex used to work in Tokyo, and it seems to have functioned as a suburb of the Tokyo area during the bubble era. In addition, the shortest commute to Chiba Station is 50 minutes, but if one worked at a company a bit far from Chiba Station, the commute would easily exceed one hour. This is the time when I go to the office. One of the characteristics of detached housing complexes is that many of them are built on a small hill and named "XX-hills," and Yoshinodai Danchi is no different. This means that the commute home takes 5 to 10 minutes longer. In addition, since it takes less than 40 minutes to reach the waterfront factories by car, the complex, which exists at a distance that does not function as a suburb of Tokyo, Chiba, Ichihara, and their respective urban areas, is considered to be in inevitable decline since there is no reason for anyone to choose it. That said, there is a slightly larger apartment complex in the neighborhood called Kofudai, which still maintains a higher land value than the Yoshinodai complex, but the fact that this complex is just barely a 30-minute drive to the waterfront area would also indicate a barrier due to distance to where one works.