The case of the Tokyo metropolitan area
Housing asset value in 2018
To which extent a structural decline in housing asset values may hit in the Tokyo metropolitan area from 2019 to 2045? A predictive analysis was co-signed with her colleagues at Tokyo City University by Sophie BUHNIK, associate researcher at the Géographie-cités laboratory.
With shrinking cities becoming a global issue, declining housing demands due to declining population leads to a reduction in land prices. Housing asset value deflation occurs mainly in suburbs, which has an economic effect on elderly households. Although some issues have already been indicated, it is unclear whether the deflation of housing assets will have a significant impact on shrinking cities. We used 209 municipality bases to predict the decreasing value of housing assets in the Tokyo metropolitan area from 2019 to 2045. The deflation of housing asset value was estimated by considering the regional differences in population.
“We adopted a regression model for analysis. The value of housing asset deflation is projected to be approximately 94 trillion JPY by 2045. Although the degree of deflation differed by municipality, the deflation of housing asset value occurred in nearly all municipalities: Central Tokyo was an exception. Additionally, the deflation value in many suburban municipalities exceeded 10 million JPY per household. Thereafter, a case study analysis was conducted using the average household in the Tokyo metropolitan area. The study results imply that deflation of housing assets is unavoidable for households in suburbs, and it becomes new barriers to promoting compact cities.
It is considered that the housing asset deflation in the Tokyo metropolitan area is largely contributed by the decrease of housing demand in the suburbs due to the population decline and behavior of choosing a place of residence for double-income households, which has been increasing rapidly recently. As the population decline and trend of increasing double-income households become more prominent in the future, asset deflation in the suburbs of the Tokyo metropolitan area is expected to continue for the time being.”
Sophie BUHNIK holds a PhD in geography and spatial planning from the University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne. Her thesis was awarded the Philippe Aydalot Prize of the Association de science régionale de langue française and the Grand Prix de la Ville (PUCA/APERAU/CDC). Associated with the Géographie-cités laboratory where she conducted her thesis, she participated in comparative work on the shrinkage of shops and services in small and medium-sized towns and on shrinking towns in general. She is currently working as a researcher at the Faculty of Urban Life Studies of the Tokyo City University and associate researcher (2021-pst.) at the Maison franco-japonaise (Tokyo), where she is coordinating an International Emerging Action on the management of vacant and depreciated private real estate in shrinking cities in Japan, with the support of CNRS. She is currently working as a researcher at the Faculty of Urban Life Studies of the Tokyo City University and an associate researcher (2021-pst.) at the Maison franco-japonaise (Tokyo), where she coordinated from 2020 to 2022 an International Emerging Action about the rise of negative real estate in Japan, in comparative perspective with France, with the support of CNRS.
