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01-20-2011, 03:29 AM
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Here are two good stories concerning two people I know. The first is a salaryman who is married and has a daughter in junior high school. Last year he bought three annual passports for the Tokyo Disney Resorts. These passports are expensive, costing more than $900 each. He, his wife, and his daughter go to Disney every week (they live one station away), and during these visits, he, his wife, and his daughter will each buy 3 Duffy or Sally Mae teddy bears. Disney limits purchases of these bears to 3 per person, the cost for each bear is about 3500 yen. When he gets home with the 9 bears, he takes photos of them with his cell phone, and lists them for sale on eBay Japan. He sells them for about 7500 yen each. At this price, if he visits Disney once each week, he will make enough money to pay for his annual passports in 6 months. At the end of the year, he will have made about $3500 in extra cash. Another person I know is a retired factory worker who used to assemble televisions for Panasonic. A couple of years before retiring be bought himself a new home computer. He became interested in the internet, and decided to make a home page for his family. He bought a couple of books and found some instructional videos on Youtube showing how to make web pages. After a couple of weeks of work he ended up making a good, family home page. His friends and relatives liked the home page, and asked him to make pages for them as well. Being a nice guy, he did as they asked, and made the pages without being paid. Then a family friend who had a dry-cleaning shop asked if he could make a website for her store, she offered to pay 50,000 yen for the job. He agreed, and he made her a nice site. Other small business people were impressed by the website, and he began to get busy making webpages for many of the small shops and stores in his area. After a year, he was making more money building webpages at home than he was making building televisions at work. He was tempted to quit his job, but he was only one year away from retirement, so his wife persuaded him to keep working. After retirement be began making websites full-time, and last year a large company offered to buy his website business from him. This story is interesting because the man involved was nearly 60 years old, and didn't really have much experience with computers or building webpages. But he put in the effort to learn, and he had a little good luck. Once he began to make a little money, he was motivated to work harder, and after that he simply made his own luck. With the internet and a worldwide market, it is now easier than ever to start a business or simply find a niche which makes a little extra money. You can find a way if you take the time and trouble to look for it. You can't ever tell yourself that it's not possible, or that it's too difficult, because saying such things often make them true. Opportunities most often come at times when the economy is rising or declining. At the moment there is a decline, people have less money to spend, and there are bargains to be found if one looks for them. The idea is either take advantage of things you can find cheaply and sell for a profit, or provide a service which is in demand when times are difficult. There are 2 types of people in the world, those that can, and those that can't. The difference between them has nothing to do with education, environment, or intelligence, it has to do with simple choice. You can choose to get ahead and do what it takes to get ahead, or you can toss up your hands and be taken by the tide. At the moment the tide is moving down and out. 
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01-20-2011, 03:55 AM
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"Those people, in Manhattan. They are better than us." "Why?" "Because they want things they haven't seen." She's talking about visionaries. The reason 80% of small businesses fail is not because they are a bad idea, but is because 80% of small businesses never actually make it to market. People give up before there is a chance to actually make money. Have you ever asked yourself "How does that store stay in business?" Because they followed through, that's why.
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01-26-2011, 02:02 PM
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I was told that many new houses built from a special timber that is very expensive cost a great deal of money. Are they built to last and survive earthquakes etc. also I heard that often mortgages are so high that often when the owners pass on-- their family still have to carry on paying the mortgage. I wonder how difficult it is to actually get a mortgage on Old Property as against modern property.
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01-26-2011, 02:33 PM
Buying a house in Japan is not difficult, and in Japan foreigners are allowed to buy homes/property, which isn't the case in most of Asia. If I look at a real estate guide I will find properties of all types and ages for sale, from historical farm houses to ultra-modern penthouse apartments. The price of course varies depending on location and size.
I recently looked at a large home about 300 meters from Kujukuri Beach (I like to surf) in Chiba. The house was an older Japanese type home with cedar construction and a traditional tile roof. It had 2 floors, with 4 bedrooms, living room, kitchen, etc. It was on a surprisingly large lot, approximately 1/3 acre in size. The price for the lot and house was 15 million yen, under $200,000. In Japan there are still people who get multi-generation mortgages. In the past, 3 or more generations of family members lived in the same house. Given the high cost of a home in the city, and the rather low annual income of the typical Japanese, one can still get a 70 or even a 100 year mortgage on a property, and the payments are passed from one generation to the next. As in most places, the ability to get a mortgage depends on the value of the home, the amount of the loan, and the creditworthiness of the buyer. All things balancing out, getting a loan isn't difficult. As a non-permanent resident, I can't qualify for a loan from a traditional Japanese bank, but I can get a loan from a foreign bank, as there are a few who write loans on Japanese real estate. Another thing about Japan (which is different from places like America), the value of the house is usually much higher than the value of the land. I can get a building lot within an hour of Tokyo for about 3 million yen ($30K). But it will cost at least $100K to build a decent home on it, about double the American price. The methods of construction are somewhat different in Japan than America, but not enough to justify the great difference in cost. Used homes are a bargain in most parts of the country, as Japanese people have a built-in dislike for anything old or used. I have seen farm houses in half decent condition sell at auction for less than 2 million yen. You can check out Yahoo auctions Japan and look at the real estate section, you would be surprised what some properties sell for.
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01-27-2011, 04:35 PM
@Sangetsu:
USD 200'000 is quite cheap, a lot cheaper than Holland/Switzerland (my two reference points) But when you say a 70 - 100 year mortgage, how much must the property be worth then? Surely you are talking about mortgages for multi-million dollar houses?
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