Tokyo Kantei just released data indicating that Tokyo currently has 26.2% of available apartments nationwide, which amounts to 1,861,256 apartment listings. Kanagawa and Osaka come in at 2nd and 3rd place for number available apartment dwellings— with Kanagawa at 953,397 listings and Osaka at 801,766 listings.

Interestingly, it is also noted that 30.3% of available resale apartments nationwide are also over 30 years old. This is largely due to the fact that many large-scale residential development pro occurred during the economic bubble in the 1980s; those buildings are still standing today. In Tokyo, 614,849 available apartments were built over 30 years ago and 479,939 available apartments were built less than 10 years ago.

Within Tokyo, Koto ward has the most number of available resale apartments at 117,024 listings in total. This specific area saw a huge spike in the number of apartments in the 2000s when towering apartment complexes were built along the Tokyo Bay area; more than half of those apartments were built less than 10 years ago. There are 39,801 listings of those more recently built resale apartments, which is a high number compared to other parts of Tokyo.

A large number of resale apartments are also found in traditionally popular and expensive parts of Tokyo, but unlike apartments in Koto ward, most of these were built over 30 years ago. In Setagaya ward, out of 108,466 listings, 41,617 are over 30 years old. In Ota ward, out of 103,097 listings, 31,590 listings are 30 years old. In Minato-ku, out of 100,270 listings, 39,678 listings are over 30 years old.  The same pattern is seen for Shinjuku, Itabashi, Shinagawa, and Nerima, and most other wards within the Tokyo metropolitan area. 

Source: Tokyo Kantei report, January 21, 2019

By Kaori Kitagawa

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