Given how expensive land is, even on the outskirts of Tokyo, I imagine it's not possible to haggle the price down very much. My realtor said, for example, if some land is asking 4880万, you might be able to get 4800万 perhaps, but it's hard, and if they have any other offers, you're just out.
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Bought a house and haggled it down 500万
how much in total?
3300万 in total - Edogawa!
Wait, a house (with garden and so) in Edogawa for 3300万? This does not compute, can you really find something so cheap?
Yep! It’s a shithole in a shit location!
Could you elaborate? I mean, is not Central Tokyo, but you are 20 minutes far with a train ride, and it is just a location without the touristic things - which I think is very positive.
Hmmm well most of Edogawa is on the hazard map - if the river floods we are damned, its right next to a train track too so there’s that
It’s a “fixer up-er” so while I think most people might just demolish and build one of those system prefabricated homes that all look the same, I saw some retro charm and that ultimately made it less desirable to most and cheaper for me haha (also haggling)
Did the sale posting say they planned on tearing down the old house? I'm looking at various land for sale and I see a bunch where it looks like the seller will demolish the house, but only after getting a buyer for the land. I didn't get the feeling that the houses were savable. I'm not really able to fix them up myself, but that does sound super interesting and much cheaper.
That wasn’t the case for me but as you say every situation is different- a lot are beyond repair or just assumed to be valued at ¥0 Sometimes leasehold land & house combos are a thing too ! Keep looking and even go walking around the neighbourhoods you like !
I really like that you see the positive tho - I love living here so much the community is the best, it’s just not a ‘smart investment’ in that it will probably not be worth anything in 30 years Whereas an apartment in Shibuya would
I was able to get my land down from 60 mil to 50 mil.
The main reason I gave them was that there is another plot in the same neighborhood for 48 mil, which I mentioned. It had way more trees, and thus it would've cost a lot more to get a "clean" land - I didn't mention that part though.
My housemaker said that they won't agree to that price, but alas here I am - saving 10 mil lol
That's how haggling has always worked.
You offer a lower price, the seller either accepts it, or sells at the listed/higher price to someone else, or just outright decides to wait.
Haggling isn't just a "I asked for 10% off, why not?", it has to be based around relevant factors such as time on market, state of the building, relative purchase price, etc...
I'm not asking if I should try or not. I'm asking for successful examples to get a feel for how much lower was actually accepted.
The question is simply "For anybody who purchased land in Tokyo, how much were you able to haggle?". People can just give the area, listed price, and accepted price. In fact, somebody gave prices in Osaka, which is still a useful comparison. In hindsight, I could have worded the question "in Japan" instead of "in Tokyo".
What area? Outskirts of Tokyo is huge.
4mil... No idea why he agreed, must have been in a rush. Setagaya.
We got them to drop the price by a little under 4M yen, so maybe 5%. If there’s other plots for sale in the area that are cheaper you can use that to try and negotiate with them. Usually plots will have different advantages and disadvantages so it’s not a direct comparison but it can help.
4m was 5% off, so 80m for just the land?
We negotiated it down to 76M, in Shinagawa.
5%
Not Tokyo but on a popular suburb of Osaka close to a major train hub where multiple lines meet:
Price asked was 2580. I offered 2200, the seller counter-offered 2280 and I accepted it.
My realtor also said that I should offer "2500", similar to the discount your realtor asked, but in the end we got a much better deal. On the other hand, before that I had offered 3700 on a house with a 3750 asking price and they rejected it, of course the house was still sold only a few days later.
So, my main tip is, if the price is too high for you, wait a month. If it's not sold within that time, you can lowball the owner. Works better with company owned land (not private), as companies usually want to sell it faster.
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