Snow country
Episode 01
Niigata · 新潟県
Snow country
A 120-year-old kominka with a hand-cut hinoki frame.
- Price
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- Built
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- Size
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Revealed Jun 3, 2026
準備中 · One moment
One moment, the house is unlocking…
0 empty houses33 days to first episode∞ stories ahead
近日公開Launching Wednesday, June 3, 2026 · 33 days to goThe akiya you can actually buy.
Coming soon.
A new podcast from Old Houses Japan. David Lake and Victoria Lane are recording the first season now — real Japanese homes you can buy, the prices, the paperwork, the people. First episode lands on Wednesday, June 3, 2026.
公開まで · Until episode one
32
days
21
hours
08
minutes
25
seconds
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予告 · A first look
Three regions you’ll see in season one.
We’ll reveal each home — prices, photos, paperwork, and the full walkthrough — on launch day. Until then, here’s the shape of what’s coming.
Heritage
Episode 02
Kyoto · 京都府
Heritage townhouse
A Murasaki-no machiya, four generations of one family.
- Price
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- Built
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- Size
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Revealed Jun 3, 2026
Sea of Japan
Episode 03
Shimane · 島根県
Sea of Japan
A coastal cottage at the price of a used car.
- Price
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- Built
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- Size
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Revealed Jun 3, 2026
日本地図 · Where season one takes us
The first houses, on the map.
A preview of where season one travels — Niigata, Kyoto, Shimane, Yamanashi, Tokushima, Gifu. Each sakura dot is a real listing the show walks through. Click one to see the home, hold Cmd / Ctrl to zoom.
- Prefectures
- 0 / 47
- Homes lined up
- 0
- Episodes ready
- 0
第一季 · Season one
The first three episodes,
dropping Wednesday, June 3, 2026.
We’re recording the rest of season one now. New episodes every Tuesday after launch.
- #01
Why are nine million houses sitting empty?
The big-picture explainer — where akiya came from, what kominka are, who's buying them, and why now matters.
Coming Wednesday, June 3, 2026 - #02
Akiya banks, explained
How Japan's empty-house registries actually work, why some listings are essentially free, and the paperwork no one warns you about.
Coming Wednesday, June 3, 2026 - #03
The 3 million yen farmhouse in Niigata
We tour a 120-year-old kominka with a hand-cut hinoki frame, talk through the renovation budget line by line, and ask whether snow country is really for you.
Coming Wednesday, June 3, 2026
紹介 · About the show
Two friends, a lot of train rides, and a country full of empty houses.
David and Victoria are the co-founders of Old Houses Japan. Each week they pick a real listing — sometimes free, sometimes a few million yen — visit it, talk to the people around it, and dig into what it would actually take to live there.
Together they founded Old Houses Japan to do the unglamorous work behind the show: surfacing real listings, decoding the paperwork, mapping the grants, and introducing buyers to vetted local agents. The podcast is how you discover one of these houses; the service is how you actually move into one.
DL
Co-founder & host
David Lake
“Every old house I walk into has outlasted four generations. The least I can do is listen to it.”
David moved to Japan in 2019 chasing a single Niigata farmhouse listing. Five renovations later he's still chasing them. Carpenter, narrator-in-chief, and the show's worst-kept secret kettle hoarder.
VL
Co-founder & host
Victoria Lane
“There are nine million empty houses in Japan. We're going to introduce you to as many as we can.”
Victoria runs the data side: scraping akiya banks, mapping grants, and translating municipal forms nobody else wants to read. She brings the receipts; David brings the stories.
理念 · Why we do this
Nine million houses,
waiting.
Most aren’t ruins. They’re 1906 farmhouses with hand-cut hinoki frames and irori still drawing breath. Kyoto machiya whose families ran a bookbinding shop for four generations. Sea-side cottages going for the price of a used car.
Their owners died, or moved to Tokyo, or simply got old. Their grandchildren have apartments in Yokohama and no obvious way to inherit a house six prefectures away. So the houses sit. Some get torn down for parking lots. Most just wait.
The Old Houses Japan Podcast exists because we think they deserve a better ending than a bulldozer.
That’s why Old Houses Japan exists. Each week the podcast walks through one of these houses and tells its story. The rest of the time we do the unglamorous work — surfacing real listings, mapping the grants, reading the paperwork, introducing buyers to vetted local agents, and making sure people who actually want one of these homes can move into one.
If one listener moves into one of these houses because of something we said, that’s the whole point.
— David Lake & Victoria Lane, co-founders
夢の家 · Find your own
Hear about a house,
then go find one.
The podcast is how you discover one of these houses. Old Houses Japan is how you actually move into one. Browse the full catalogue, run your prefecture through the grants tool, and get matched to a vetted agent when you’re ready — all on the main site.
物件
Real listings, every prefecture
Hundreds of vetted houses across all 47 prefectures — kominka, machiya, akiya, and post-war finds. Photos, floor plans, and prices in plain English.
助成金
Grants matched to your situation
Japan has 500+ live municipal and prefectural subsidies for buyers, renovators, and movers. We map you to the ones you actually qualify for.
繋ぐ
Vetted local agents and craftspeople
Bilingual realtors, judicial scriveners, architects, and renovation contractors — introduced when you're ready, never before.
Be there for episode one
Get the launch in your inbox.
Subscribe and we'll email you the moment the first episode drops on Jun 3, 2026 — plus a short list of interesting akiya we find each week. No spam, unsubscribe in one click.
No spam. Unsubscribe in one click.
Jun 3, 2026
First episode
Tuesdays
Cadence
2
Hosts
6
Prefectures in S1