Japan plans national database to track foreign ownership of real estate, land as it weighs new rules

TOKYO - The government is coordinating plans to build a centralised database to ascertain the status of and manage foreign ownership of real estate, according to multiple government sources.

For property registrations such as condominium units, where there is currently no mechanism for reporting nationality, the government will move to introduce a nationality registration system. After making the present state of property acquisitions more transparent, it intends to proceed with discussions on what regulations on land purchases by foreign nationals should look like.

Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi on Nov 4 instructed relevant ministers to grasp the status of foreign land acquisitions and examine how the regulations should be.

The database would make use of the real estate base registry being developed by the digital agency.

After further deliberations among the Cabinet Secretariat, the Justice Ministry and other relevant agencies, the government hopes for the system to take effect as early as fiscal 2027.

The planned scope of registration would not be limited to property registrations for condominiums and other real estate.

It would also include forests and farmland; large-scale land transactions under the National Land Use Planning Law; and “important land” designated under the Law on the Review and Regulation of the Use of Real Estate Surrounding Important Facilities and on Remote Territorial Islands – including border islands and areas surrounding defence-related facilities.

At present, the nationality of buyers must be registered for farmland acquisitions, but not for condominiums. The government intends to use the database initiative to unify reporting requirements.

The government also aims to ensure it can identify the nature of purchases even when foreign funds are used to acquire real estate through Japan-based corporations.

For transactions involving forests and large-scale or important land, the government is leaning towards requiring corporations to declare the nationalities of principal shareholders and executives.

Under the Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Law, foreign nationals living overseas are currently only subject to notification requirements regarding real estate purchases in limited cases, such those for investment purposes. The government is expected to expand the range of transactions covered.

Behind the push to increase transparency is public anxiety, including concerns that “foreigners are buying up land in Japan” or that “water-source areas are being acquired and groundwater is being extracted”. Some have also pointed to speculative buying by foreigners as a factor driving up condominium prices.

If a system is put in place to register and track nationality and related information, it could lay the groundwork for measures such as the setting of different real estate-related tax rates for Japanese and non-Japanese owners, or establishing conditions to regulate acquisitions.

The government plans to summarise what form regulation will take in a basic policy on foreign resident and immigration-related measures that it aims to draw up in January 2026. THE JAPAN NEWS/ASIA NEWS NETWORK