360°

If you've ever browsed Japanese real estate listings, whether on Suumo, Homes, or sometimes even a local agency's website, you've probably noticed something strange. The photos are often low-quality, poorly lit, and sometimes are not helpful at all.

You get pixelated images, weird angles, cluttered rooms, and even photos taken from the outside with no interior shots at all. Sometimes you just get a floor plan (or even worse... just a lot drawing) and if you are real unlucky, you don't even get photos of the property at all - but photos instead of the nearby establishments and landmarks like a nearby convenience store, nearest station entrance, or a nearby school or community center.

Although some of the more expensive properties may have better quality photos, the large majority of real estate listings still seem like they are stuck in the 90's internet era with their low resolution pictures. Is there something unique in Japan why things are the way they are? Well to find out, we did some digging into this topic and talked to some people in the industry.

Many of the real estate agencies display their available listings on the window of their stores like this one here. Property flyers like these are probaby the default way of advertising property.

Let's start with the most obvious and general reason on why real estate photos in Japan are the way they are and haven't seem to have caught up with the times. Many landlords (地主) and agencies (不動産会社) are still run by traditional folks who don’t value digital presentation. For them, a listing photo is just a formality. Flashy marketing isn’t part of their business mindset, especially in low-vacancy areas where demand is stable.

Unlike in super competitive markets like New York or London, Japanese real estate agencies don’t always compete on marketing. A big part of the real estate business in Japan is based on relationships and trust.

New technologies like the internet, social media and online marketing can be seen as impersonal to real estate veterans who put face to face customer interaction and personal service as the cornerstones of how they do business.

Many Japanese people who are on the lookout for property, often already have a specific area or neighborhood in mind. Usually, there will be one or two local real estate firms that holds office in that area (often a close distance from the train / subway station) and that real estate firm actually becomes the immediate place when an owner is looking to rent or sell their property. By virtue of being part of the community, these real estate firms would have a good grasp and coverage over what properties are available.

Essentially having a foothold over the neighborhood, there is not much incentive to do more than the minimum when there is a consistent demand and a captured market. While this is not always the case especially for highly urbanized places, it's something you will definitely observe for the smaller less commercialized neighborhoods.

In some cases, the property for sale may actually still be occupied by either the owner or an existing tenant. For investment properties where the current owner wants to do an "owner change" this may involve the sale of the property and assuming any existing lease agreements with the current tenant. In Japan, the legal relationship between a landlord and a tenant is governed by the Civil Code of Japan (民法) and the Act on Land and Building Leases (借地借家法).

For investment properties with existing tenants

• Tenants have the right to "peaceful enjoyment" of the property they are renting. This means that landlords cannot just enter the property whenever they want. Thus, to take photos or even show the property to potential buyers, the landlord must obtain the tenant's permission through a proper reasonable notice in advance.
• The tenant is not legally obligated to grant access for this purpose and actually has the right to refuse the request. Cooperation is key so negotiating with the tenant to find a convenient time and offering some form of compensation for the disturbance may encourage tenants to cooperate.

For properties still occupied by the current owner

• Some properties only have exterior photos because the current owners may actually be still living in the property and do not want photos to be taken for privacy reasons.
• In these cases, even showing the property to potential buyers / renters in person may be a challenge because current owners often want to be present during any viewings, again for privacy reasons.

A lot of real estate agents rely on the owner, landlord or management company (管理会社) to provide the property photos. Many of these property managers don’t bother hiring professional photographers as they don't have the budget, and instead just snap a few quick pics on an old phone, if at all.

Some real estate agents who do take the effort to try to get better photos will also not hire professional photographers and instead try to take the photo themselves either using their own smartphone or camera. (Sometimes they are actually required to use the real estate company's equipment like the company phone or camera!)

While we can at least credit these agents for taking the effort, the results will obviously not be the same as getting a real estate photographer.

This flyer is a rare example with "comprehensive" information. It has the location map, floor plan, and actually some pictures of both exterior and interior of the property.

After talking with some real estate agents both in-person and online, a lot of them actually don't have anything against high quality photos and some even believe these are effective tools to help promote a property in the market.

However, the reality is that most real estate agents have a lot of clients (each month adding more) and they need to be able to determine which ones are serious and thus more likely to complete a contract than those who are just browsing. Customers who are willing to view the property in person are deemed as more serious and will also get the proportional time and energy from agents in helping them find a property and complete the contract.

This is where properties with a few photos becomes a way to differentiate the "serious" prospective buyers / renters. Prospects who are willing to view the property in person despite the lack of pictures (as long it matches the criteria they are looking for) is a strong signal to real estate agents that they are serious looking for a property.

Online listings can also be scanned versions of the paper flyers.

If you are looking for a property as a buyer / renter

• First of all, despite majority of listings having low quality photos, there are also a lot of listings that have good photos available and some firms (e.g. Blueground Tokyo) even utilize virtual tours for all their listings. If you are outside of Japan (or on a faraway prefecture) and are trying to find a property remotely, then you can try to concentrate your search on those listings which already have good pics. However, you will miss out on a large part of the market and potentially some good deals. If you have the budget, you might want to consider contracting with remote viewing service providers to capture the property on your behalf. More on this at the end of the article.
• If you are already in Japan and your desired location is within commuting distance, you can just accept that there will be challenges with the availability of photos online due to the reasons above. If you are in the market for a particular neighborhood, it might be worthwhile to look into the local real estate firm in that area and just accept that you will be doing things the traditional "old school" way.
• If you are lucky to find an agent who is mobile, you can ask a favor if they can take a photo on your behalf for a property you are interested in (assuming you are not able to view the property in person with your agent for some reason). Take note though that unless the property is within your agent's route, they may not be able to do this especially if what you are interested in is in some far flung location. Also be considerate when asking to make sure it is not too much of an inconvenience and make sure you recognize this effort by the agent by being 100% serious about the property.

If you are a property owner looking to sell or lease your property

• Whether you're dealing with an exclusive brokerage agreement or have opened up your property to multiple real estate companies - if you want a higher chance to sell / lease your property, you want more prospects to be made aware that it exists in the first place. Ask your real estate agent how they plan to handle marketing your property and whether they will invest in professional photography services.
• If you find that the photos are lacking or you are dealing with really old fashioned real estate companies, consider checking other real estate agents that will invest more effort in marketing your property like investing in professional photography services.
• In some cases, you can also look into investing in professional photography yourself. Since you own the photos, you are able to ensure the quality of the photos and this would be a valuable investment especially for leasing or short-term rentals (Airbnb) where property photos are almost always what draws potential customers to your listing first. Investing in professional marketing of your property shows potential tenants / guests that you are thoughtful and detail-oriented about running your Airbnb / minpaku / rental property.

If you are a real estate agent

• If you are not already using professional photography services, it may be worth considering this for some specific properties. As the experts in your area, you have probably already developed the ability to identify properties that will sell / lease immediately with little marketing as soon as they hit the market as well as those which will require more promotional effort. Being upfront with your client when their property is challenging, you can suggest various measures to make it more desirable. Some basic cleaning or organizing of the interior combined with professional photography to present the best characteristics of the place in a transparent way could increase the chances for success in matching these difficult properties with the perfect renter / buyer.
• If you don't have the budget for photography, consider bringing this up with the property owner as a suggestion who may be willing to cover the cost or checking if at the company level, they would be willing to cover the expense. Again, investing in professional photography in some cases (like Airbnb, minpaku, rentals) can provide long term benefits as marketing these properties is a continuous exercise.

At SHIBUYA360° we are imaging experts first and we strive to understand the real estate market better so we can provide better services and support this important industry through our real estate photography and virtual tour production services.

We learned a lot hearing from real estate agents we talked to (as well as some real estate customers) on what are the reasons why real estate listings in the Japanese market have little or low quality photos. This is definitely not the case for all listings and in other articles, we will explore the firms that have invested not just in professional real estate photography but even 360° virtual tours to provide better services for their customers.

During our conversations with real estate experts, there were some aspects of the customer psychology that we learned but didn't exactly fit this article. Check out our other articles related to Japanese real estate below.

• If you are a real estate property owner, Airbnb host, minpaku owner, or real estate agent that is looking to stand out and promote your listing(s) using real estate photography or 360° virtual tours, please feel free to reach out to us for a free consultation. We would love to have the opportunity to support you and your business.

• If you are interested in a specific real estate property but don't have the time or opportunity to view it yourself (and are not able to obtain quality photos or want to have higher assurances on a property's situation), consider our real estate photography + virtual tour production service. We can focus on specific aspects you care about combining photography, video walkthrough and laser measuring to reconstruct floor plans / check whether the property meets your requirements.

We'd like to thank the real estate agents and experts that have shared their insights with us through chat and in online forums that allowed us to create this article.