Search

Japan's post-war housing system has been dominated by family-owned housing. However, the centrality of family home ownership has declined since the 1990s. Housing careers and family formation patterns have diverged leading to the re-organisation of boundaries separating owning and renting. Using Japan as a focus, this paper explores the role of individualisation and familisation in transforming homeowner societies. On one hand, the individualisation of younger generations in Japan has encouraged a notable increase in one-person households living in private rented housing. On the other hand, a growing number of young households have purchased houses with assistance from their parents. This has been interpreted as an intergenerational familisation of access to home ownership. There is also an increasing number of unmarried adults living in their parents’ homes, which reflects the individualisation of younger cohorts and simultaneously the familisation of adult children's early housing careers. Moreover, it has recently been pointed out that Japan's system of extended family households and the related practice of transferring family properties across generations, has not declined. This paper argues that individualisation and familisation are combining to reorganise the ‘edges’ of home ownership, by helping determine who can enter owner-occupied housing sectors, and who is excluded. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Over the past two decades housing pathways have become increasingly differentiated between generations, particularly in advanced societies dominated by owner-occupied tenure systems. Demographic transformations caused by aging and falling fertility rates, along with a more volatile economy and a neo-liberal reorientation of governance have combined to restructure housing conditions. Drawing on empirical research in Japan, this paper illustrates the social origins and impact of generation-based differentiations in housing patterns in that country. It considers the housing experiences of three cohorts: baby-boomers, baby-busters and the 'lost generation'. The contrast of housing pathways between these generations in Japan illustrates the contemporary dynamics of housing and social processes in homeowner societies.[image omitted] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Japan's condominium sector expanded rapidly along with post-war urbanisation and high-speed economic growth. However, the bursting of the bubble economy in the 1990s undermined land and housing markets. Capital losses on condominiums have been disproportionate, especially in cases of older, smaller or non-centrally located condominiums. This analysis incorporates socio-cultural elements in explaining emerging patterns of fragmentation among homeowners and property values. It illustrates relationships between the meaning of housing commodities and the context of indigenous production and consumption processes in urban Japan. The paper specifically draws upon data from interviews with Japanese homeowners to illustrate the significance of values and perceptions in the modern condominium sector and their relationship to changing socioeconomic conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]