Guide
Getting a mortgage in Japan as a foreigner: what the Civil Code attaches to the property
Whether any lender will advance money, and on what terms, is that lender's decision and no statute settles it. What the statutes do settle is everything that happens to the property once the money is advanced: the charge that is created over it, the entry that records that charge and stays until something removes it, the tax on making that entry, how far the charge reaches into unpaid interest, what the execution court may do if the debt is not paid, and a reporting duty under the foreign exchange legislation that turns on whether the buyer lives in Japan. This page sets out those provisions with their article numbers, so that the right questions can be put to the lender, the judicial scrivener and the tax professional whose job it is to answer them.
Published · Checked against Japanese primary sources on 1 September 2026
Written by SHINWA CREATIVE, K.K., a welding and metalwork company in Miyagi Prefecture
What these statutes say about who may own
The Japanese word for the security a home loan takes over a property is teitoken (抵当権), and the rules for it sit in the Civil Code at Articles 369 to 398-22. Before any of that comes a question of capacity, and the Civil Code disposes of it in one sentence.
外国人は、法令又は条約の規定により禁止される場合を除き、私権を享有する。A foreigner enjoys private rights except where the provisions of a law or a treaty forbid it. Ownership of land and buildings, and the capacity to grant a charge over them, are private rights. The exception is expressed as a reference to other provisions, so the sentence is a rule about where any restriction would have to be found rather than a guarantee that none exists.
Two further measurements were taken rather than asserted. We retrieved the Civil Code, the Real Property Registration Act, the Banking Act and the Money Lending Business Act as e-Gov serves them at asof=2026-09-01, including the supplementary provisions returned with each, and searched the text for 国籍 (nationality). The string occurs zero times in each of those four acts. We ran the same search over the Civil Execution Act and found it eleven times, every one of them inside 船舶国籍証書 and the surrounding provisions about a ship's certificate of nationality in Articles 114, 115 and 120, which concern the arrest of vessels and not the people who own property.
That is a search of five statutes and nothing more. It says where the word does not appear. It does not say what a lender decides, because a lender's credit assessment is not a statutory matter, and this page describes no lender's criteria at any point.
A statute about foreigners and charges existed, and was repealed
The supplementary provisions the Civil Code carries from Act No. 134 of 2003 include an article headed 外国人の抵当権に関する法律等の廃止, the repeal of the Act on Mortgages of Foreigners and other acts. Its first item reads 一外国人の抵当権に関する法律（明治三十二年法律第六十七号）. An act of 1899 bearing that title was repealed by the 2003 amendment, which is the same amendment whose Article 5 deals with leases of charged property existing when it came into force. We could not retrieve the repealed act's own text: e-Gov's law index does not return it, so nothing here describes what it contained. Article 1 of those supplementary provisions leaves the commencement date to a cabinet order made within a year of promulgation, and we did not retrieve that cabinet order either, so no date is given for the repeal.
The charge the Civil Code creates
Article 369(1) defines what the lender receives. The definition turns on one feature: possession does not move.
抵当権者は、債務者又は第三者が占有を移転しないで債務の担保に供した不動産について、他の債権者に先立って自己の債権の弁済を受ける権利を有する。The holder of the charge has the right to be paid the claim before other creditors out of the property that the debtor or a third party has given as security without transferring possession. The borrower stays in the house. Nothing is handed over. What the lender obtains is a rank against other creditors, and Article 373 says how that rank is fixed: 同一の不動産について数個の抵当権が設定されたときは、その抵当権の順位は、登記の前後による。 Where several charges are created over the same property, their order is the order of registration. Article 4(1) of the Real Property Registration Act states the same rule for registered rights in general, with the qualification 法令に別段の定めがある場合を除き, except where a law provides otherwise.
How far the charge reaches
Article 370 extends the charge beyond the thing described in the register, and it opens with an exclusion that matters in Japan more than the drafting suggests.
抵当権は、抵当地の上に存する建物を除き、その目的である不動産（以下「抵当不動産」という。）に付加して一体となっている物に及ぶ。ただし、設定行為に別段の定めがある場合及び債務者の行為について第四百二十四条第三項に規定する詐害行為取消請求をすることができる場合は、この限りでない。The charge extends to things annexed to and forming one body with the charged property, other than a building standing on the charged land, and the proviso removes that extension where the instrument creating the charge provides otherwise and where the debtor's act is open to a claim to rescind a fraudulent act under Article 424(3). A separate guide on this site sets out why land and buildings are registered separately in Japan; the exclusion at the start of Article 370 is that separation carried into the law of security. Article 371 adds that once there has been a default on the secured claim, the charge extends to fruits of the property arising afterwards.
What Article 370 means for a particular air conditioner, boundary wall or set of solar panels is not addressed here. The article uses an abstract phrase, the answer for any given object is a question of how a court reads that phrase, and no case law has been read for this page.
The two years of interest the charge reaches
Article 375 places a ceiling on the part of the debt that the security itself covers. It is a rule about the charge, not about the debt.
抵当権者は、利息その他の定期金を請求する権利を有するときは、その満期となった最後の二年分についてのみ、その抵当権を行使することができる。ただし、それ以前の定期金についても、満期後に特別の登記をしたときは、その登記の時からその抵当権を行使することを妨げない。２前項の規定は、抵当権者が債務の不履行によって生じた損害の賠償を請求する権利を有する場合におけるその最後の二年分についても適用する。ただし、利息その他の定期金と通算して二年分を超えることができない。Where the holder has a right to interest or other periodic payments, the charge may be exercised only for the last two years of them that have fallen due. The proviso preserves earlier periodic payments where a special registration has been made after they fell due, and from the time of that registration. Paragraph (2) applies the same two-year measure to damages for default, and its own proviso caps the combined total at two years.
Two consequences follow from the text. The first is that the principal is not limited by this article at all; Article 375 speaks only of interest, other periodic payments and damages. The second is that the article governs the priority the charge carries against other creditors, and says nothing about what the borrower owes. A debt is owed whether or not the security reaches it. Article 394(1) makes that explicit from the other direction: the holder may be paid out of other assets only for the part of the claim not satisfied out of the price of the charged property.
Why this appears on the register
Article 88(1)(ii) of the Real Property Registration Act makes an agreement on damages under Article 375(2) of the Civil Code one of the particulars entered for a charge, and item (i) does the same for an agreement about interest. The two-year rule is therefore not a hidden term. The figures it operates on are set out in the register itself.
What goes on the register, and one line for foreign currency
A registration of a charge carries three layers of particulars. Article 59 of the Real Property Registration Act lists what any registration of a right must contain, Article 83(1) adds what any security interest must contain, and Article 88 adds what is specific to a charge.
| Provision | What is entered |
|---|---|
| Art. 59 | The purpose of the registration; the date and number of receipt of the application; the cause of the registration and its date; the name and address of the holder of the right, with each holder’s share where there are two or more; a term about extinguishment of the right if there is one; a prohibition on partition of co-owned property if there is one; the name, address and ground of a person who applied in another’s place under Art. 423 of the Civil Code or another provision; and what the Ministry of Justice order prescribes for making the order of rights clear. |
| Art. 83(1) | The amount of the claim, or its value where the claim is not for a fixed sum (item i); the debtor’s name and address (item ii); the right that is charged, where the object is a right other than ownership (item iii); the two or more properties and rights, where the security covers more than one (item iv); and, where the claim is denominated in a foreign currency, the maximum secured amount expressed in Japanese currency (item v). |
| Art. 88(1) | An agreement about interest (item i); an agreement on damages under Art. 375(2) of the Civil Code (item ii); a condition attached to the claim (item iii); a term departing from the proviso to Art. 370 of the Civil Code (item iv); a term for issue of a mortgage security (item v); and, where item (v) applies, terms about the due date and place of payment (item vi). |
Item (v) of Article 83(1) is short and reads as follows.
五外国通貨で第一号の債権額を指定した債権を担保する質権若しくは転質又は抵当権の登記にあっては、本邦通貨で表示した担保限度額Where the amount of the claim under item (i) has been designated in a foreign currency, the registration of the pledge, sub-pledge or charge states a maximum secured amount expressed in Japanese currency. The register is kept in yen. A claim denominated in another currency is admitted, and the entry then carries a yen ceiling for the security. Nothing in the article says how that ceiling is arrived at, and nothing here says what a lender would propose.
Article 83(2) adds a mechanism for a loan secured on more than one property: 登記官は、前項第四号に掲げる事項を明らかにするため、法務省令で定めるところにより、共同担保目録を作成することができる。 The registrar may prepare a kyodo tanpo mokuroku (共同担保目録), a joint collateral schedule, to make the item (iv) particulars clear. Where a house and the land under it are separate properties, both may stand behind one loan, and that schedule is what ties them together on the register.
What it costs to put the charge on
Registering the charge is a taxable registration. Table 1, item 1 of the Registration and Licence Tax Act is the table for registrations of real property, and sub-item (v) covers the creation of a charge along with the registrations of attachment and of restriction on disposal listed beside it.
（五） 先取特権の保存、質権若しくは抵当権の設定、強制競売、担保不動産競売（その例による競売を含む。以下単に「競売」という。）、強制管理若しくは担保不動産収益執行に係る差押え、仮差押え、仮処分又は抵当付債権の差押えその他権利の処分の制限の登記債権金額、極度金額又は不動産工事費用の予算金額千分の四The base is the amount of the claim, the maximum amount or the budgeted cost of the works, and the rate is four thousandths. The base is therefore the borrowing, not the value of the property, and it is not the price paid for the house.
The reduced rate, and the four claims it names
Article 75 of the Act on Special Measures concerning Taxation reduces that rate to one thousandth. The conditions are stacked inside a single long sentence, and they are worth separating out.
- The person taking the loan is an 個人, an individual.
- The period runs from 1 April 1984 to 31 March 2027 (令和九年三月三十一日).
- The building is a jutaku yo kaoku (住宅用家屋), a dwelling house within Article 72-2, and the individual has put it 当該個人の居住の用に供した, to use as that individual's residence.
- The registration is one 当該住宅用家屋の新築等後一年以内に登記を受けるものに限り, confined to registrations received within one year of the construction or acquisition, as the Ministry of Finance order prescribes.
What counts as a dwelling house is fixed by Article 41 of the enforcement order, not by the Act. That article requires a certificate from the mayor of the municipality or the head of the special ward, issued on the individual's own application, and it sets the size test at 床面積の合計が五十平方メートル以上であるもの for a whole house, and at その床面積が五十平方メートル以上であるもの for a residential part within a divided building of the two kinds its items describe. Fifty square metres is the floor.
Fifty square metres for this tax, forty for the acquisition tax
The registration and licence tax reliefs and the acquisition tax deductions use different floor-area figures, and a compact urban flat can sit between them. The calculator on this site works both taxes from the same inputs and shows where they part company. Article 42(1)(ii) of the same enforcement order adds a further condition for a previously used house: it must meet the earthquake standard or have been built on or after 1 January 1982.
Article 75 then does something the surrounding articles do not: it lists four claims that may be secured, and names, for each, the person who may take the charge at the reduced rate.
| Item | The claim | Who may take the charge |
|---|---|---|
| (i) | A claim for the loan of funds for the construction or acquisition | The party that made that loan |
| (ii) | A right of indemnity arising from a guarantee of the debt under that loan | The party that gave the guarantee |
| (iii) | A claim for instalments, where the price is paid by instalments | The party that received the price by instalments |
| (iv) | A loan claim the Japan Housing Finance Agency has taken over from a financial institution under Art. 13(1)(i) of the Agency’s own Act | The Japan Housing Finance Agency (独立行政法人住宅金融支援機構) |
Item (ii) is the reason a register entry sometimes names a party other than the bank that advanced the money: a guarantor with a right of indemnity is within the article in its own right. Item (iv) names the Japan Housing Finance Agency and the securitisation business in Article 13(1)(i) of its Act, which is the machinery behind the fixed-rate lending programme that operates through private financial institutions. The tax article recognises these structures. It does not say who may borrow under any of them, and this page does not either.
One loan, several properties
Article 13(2) of the Registration and Licence Tax Act addresses a charge created over several properties for the same claim. Where the application is not the first one, the tax on that application is 当該抵当権等の設定登記等に係る不動産等に関する権利の件数一件につき千五百円, ¥1,500 for each right in property covered by it, and the article confines that treatment to applications accompanied by the document the Ministry of Finance order prescribes as evidence that the paragraph applies. Article 15 governs the rounding of the base.
The other kind of charge, and why the register looks different
The Civil Code provides for a second form of the same security. A ne-teitoken (根抵当権), a revolving charge, secures not one claim but a shifting set of them up to a ceiling.
抵当権は、設定行為で定めるところにより、一定の範囲に属する不特定の債権を極度額の限度において担保するためにも設定することができる。２前項の規定による抵当権（以下「根抵当権」という。）の担保すべき不特定の債権の範囲は、債務者との特定の継続的取引契約によって生ずるものその他債務者との一定の種類の取引によって生ずるものに限定して、定めなければならない。A charge may be created to secure unspecified claims within a defined scope, up to a kyodogaku (極度額), a maximum amount. The scope must be limited to claims arising from a specified continuing contract with the debtor, or from その他債務者との一定の種類の取引, other transactions of a certain kind with the debtor. Article 398-3(1) lets the holder exercise the revolving charge for the whole of the fixed principal together with interest, other periodic payments and damages, up to the maximum amount, which means the two-year measure in Article 375 does not shape it in the same way.
The difference shows on the register. Article 88(2) sets out the particulars for a revolving charge and does so by excluding item (i) of Article 83(1), the amount of the claim, and requiring instead 担保すべき債権の範囲及び極度額, the scope of the claims to be secured and the maximum amount. An entry showing a maximum amount and a scope, rather than a fixed claim amount, is an entry made under Article 88(2). Which form any particular lender uses is a matter for the loan documents, and this page does not describe what any lender does.
What the statutes provide if the debt is not paid
Enforcement of a charge is governed by the Civil Execution Act, and Article 180 gives the creditor a choice between two methods.
不動産…を目的とする担保権（以下この章において「不動産担保権」という。）の実行は、次に掲げる方法であつて債権者が選択したものにより行う。一担保不動産競売（競売による不動産担保権の実行をいう。以下この章において同じ。）の方法二担保不動産収益執行（不動産から生ずる収益を被担保債権の弁済に充てる方法による不動産担保権の実行をいう。以下この章において同じ。）の方法The first is an auction of the property. The second applies the revenue the property produces to the secured claim, leaving ownership where it is. Article 181(1) allows the procedure to open only on an application in respect of registered security, or on production of one of the documents or electronic records listed in its item (ii). Article 188 applies the rules on execution against real property to enforcement of security.
Article 59(1) states what a sale does to the interests standing over the property: 不動産の上に存する先取特権、使用及び収益をしない旨の定めのある質権並びに抵当権は、売却により消滅する。 Statutory liens, pledges carrying a term against use and profit, and charges are extinguished by the sale. Article 59(4) then leaves the buyer answerable for the claims secured by a right of retention and by the pledges outside paragraph (2). Article 82(1) has the court clerk commission the transfer registration and the cancellation of what the sale has destroyed, and Article 82(4) puts the registration and licence tax and the other costs of that commission on the buyer.
The extinguishment claim, for someone who buys charged property
Articles 379 to 386 give a route to a person who acquires property that is already charged. Article 379 is one line: 抵当不動産の第三取得者は、第三百八十三条の定めるところにより、抵当権消滅請求をすることができる。 A third-party acquirer of charged property may make a claim to extinguish the charge, in the manner Article 383 lays down. Article 380 excludes the principal debtor, a guarantor and their successors. Article 382 requires the claim to be made before the attachment in an auction takes effect. Article 383 requires three documents to be sent to each registered creditor. Article 384 deems acceptance in four cases, the first being that the creditor does not apply for an auction within two months of receiving them. Article 386 extinguishes the charge once every registered creditor has accepted and the sum has been paid or deposited.
The mechanism is described here because it exists and its outline is not obvious from the register. How it would be used is not described. No form, no model document and no sequence of steps appears on this page, and the sending of Article 383 documents is work for the qualified professional whose own statute covers it.
Land and building are separate, and Article 388
Because a Japanese building and the land under it are separate properties with separate registers, an auction can leave them in different hands. Article 388 addresses that outcome directly.
土地及びその上に存する建物が同一の所有者に属する場合において、その土地又は建物につき抵当権が設定され、その実行により所有者を異にするに至ったときは、その建物について、地上権が設定されたものとみなす。この場合において、地代は、当事者の請求により、裁判所が定める。Where land and a building standing on it belong to the same owner, a charge is created over the land or over the building, and its enforcement brings the two into different ownership, a chijoken (地上権), a superficies, is deemed to have been created for the building. The rent is fixed by the court on the application of a party. The provision exists so that the building is not left standing on ground it has no right to occupy.
Article 389 covers the reverse sequence, a building put up after the charge over the land was created: 抵当権の設定後に抵当地に建物が築造されたときは、抵当権者は、土地とともにその建物を競売することができる。ただし、その優先権は、土地の代価についてのみ行使することができる。 The holder may put the building to auction along with the land, and the proviso confines the priority to the price of the land. Article 389(2) disapplies that where the owner of the building holds a right to occupy the land that is good against the holder of the charge.
Whether Article 388 operates in any particular case is a question for the execution court on the facts before it, and the conditions in the article are stated above in the article's own terms for that reason. No case law has been read for this page, and nothing here predicts an outcome.
The six months in Article 395
A tenant renting a property that is then sold at auction is in a position the Civil Code addresses in its own article. Article 395 is written as a delay, not as a right to remain.
抵当権者に対抗することができない賃貸借により抵当権の目的である建物の使用又は収益をする者であって次に掲げるもの（次項において「抵当建物使用者」という。）は、その建物の競売における買受人の買受けの時から六箇月を経過するまでは、その建物を買受人に引き渡すことを要しない。一競売手続の開始前から使用又は収益をする者二強制管理又は担保不動産収益執行の管理人が競売手続の開始後にした賃貸借により使用又は収益をする者２前項の規定は、買受人の買受けの時より後に同項の建物の使用をしたことの対価について、買受人が抵当建物使用者に対し相当の期間を定めてその一箇月分以上の支払の催告をし、その相当の期間内に履行がない場合には、適用しない。A person using a charged building under a lease that cannot be set up against the holder of the charge, and who falls within one of the two listed cases, is not required to hand the building over to the buyer until six months have passed from the buyer's purchase. Paragraph (2) removes that: where the buyer has demanded at least one month's worth of the consideration for use after the purchase, has fixed a reasonable period for it, and has not been paid within that period, paragraph (1) does not apply. The delay is conditional on paying for the occupation, and the article says so in its own second paragraph.
The Civil Execution Act carries the matching timing. Article 83(1) lets the execution court order delivery to a buyer who has paid the price, with a proviso for an occupier whose title is good against that buyer. Article 83(2) then reads: 買受人は、代金を納付した日から六月（買受けの時に民法第三百九十五条第一項に規定する抵当建物使用者が占有していた建物の買受人にあつては、九月）を経過したときは、前項の申立てをすることができない。 The application may not be made after six months from payment, or nine months where an occupier within Article 395(1) was in occupation at the time of purchase. Both statutes were amended together and the periods line up.
This provision replaced an older one
Article 5 of the supplementary provisions the Civil Code carries from Act No. 134 of 2003 preserves the earlier treatment for leases of charged property existing when that Act came into force, including those renewed afterwards, where the lease does not exceed the period in Article 602 and acquired its perfection requirement after the charge was registered. The same Act repealed the Act on Mortgages of Foreigners noted at the top of this page. The transitional article is the reason a lease predating that amendment is not necessarily governed by Article 395, and we have not examined how the transitional rule applies to any particular lease.
Whether a lease can be set up against the holder of a charge is decided on the facts by the court. Article 387 provides one route by which it can: a registered lease may be set up against a chargeholder who has consented and whose consent is itself registered, and Article 387(2) requires the consent of anyone who would be prejudiced by that. Sub-item (ix) of the tax table charges ¥1,000 for each right on that consent registration.
The entry that does not remove itself
Paying a loan off discharges the debt. It does not clear the register. The charge was created by a registration and it takes another registration to remove it, and the tax table prices that removal separately.
（十五） 登記の抹消（土地又は建物の表題部の登記の抹消を除く。）不動産の個数一個につき千円 （同一の申請書により二十個を超える不動産について登記の抹消を受ける場合には、申請件数一件につき二万円）Cancellation costs ¥1,000 for each property, other than a cancellation of the description part of a land or building register, and where more than twenty properties are cancelled on one application the charge is ¥20,000 for that application. A house and the land under it are two properties, so a cancellation covering both is charged on two.
Article 68 of the Real Property Registration Act adds a condition that is easy to miss.
権利に関する登記の抹消は、登記上の利害関係を有する第三者（当該登記の抹消につき利害関係を有する抵当証券の所持人又は裏書人を含む。以下この条において同じ。）がある場合には、当該第三者の承諾があるときに限り、申請することができる。Where a third party holds an interest of record, including a holder or endorser of a mortgage security with an interest in the cancellation, the application may be made only with that third party's consent. A cancellation is therefore not always a matter between the borrower and the lender alone.
Two related entries in the same table are worth noting because they are separate registrations with their own charges. Sub-item (vi) taxes a transfer of a charge at one thousandth of the claim on inheritance or company merger and two thousandths on other causes. Sub-item (viii) taxes a variation of priority under Article 374 of the Civil Code at ¥1,000 for each charge, and Article 374(2) provides that such a variation その登記をしなければ、その効力を生じない, does not take effect unless it is registered. Sub-item (xiv) taxes a supplementary or corrective registration at ¥1,000 for each property.
How a cancellation is prepared and filed is not set out here. The registration of rights in land is work reserved by statute, and this page contains no procedure, no form and no model entry.
A filing duty that catches non-residents, and the exemption that turns on use
A separate regime sits outside the Civil Code and outside the tax acts. The Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Act treats the acquisition of Japanese real property by a non-resident as a capital transaction and attaches a reporting duty to it. The whole of this section turns on a definition, so the definition comes first.
五「居住者」とは、本邦内に住所又は居所を有する自然人及び本邦内に主たる事務所を有する法人をいう。非居住者の本邦内の支店、出張所その他の事務所は、法律上代理権があると否とにかかわらず、その主たる事務所が外国にある場合においても居住者とみなす。六「非居住者」とは、居住者以外の自然人及び法人をいう。A kyojusha (居住者), a resident, is a natural person having a domicile or a residence in Japan, and a juridical person having its principal office in Japan; a Japanese branch or other office of a non-resident is deemed to be a resident even where its principal office is abroad. A hikyojusha (非居住者), a non-resident, is every other natural person and juridical person. The line is drawn by where a person lives, not by nationality. Article 6(2) leaves an unclear case to be settled as the Minister of Finance determines. Articles 22 and 23 of the Civil Code define domicile as the base of a person's life and, for a person with no domicile in Japan, deem a residence in Japan to be the domicile その者が日本人又は外国人のいずれであるかを問わず, whether that person is Japanese or foreign, subject to a proviso about the law of the domicile.
Article 20(x) makes 非居住者による本邦にある不動産若しくはこれに関する権利の取得 a capital transaction. Article 55-3(1) then requires a report, and item (xii) names the reporting party.
居住者又は非居住者が次の各号に掲げる資本取引の当事者となつたときは、政令で定める場合を除き、当該各号に定める区分に応じ、当該居住者又は非居住者は、その都度、政令で定めるところにより、当該資本取引の内容、実行の時期その他の政令で定める事項を財務大臣に報告しなければならない。…十二第二十条第十号に掲げる資本取引のうち、非居住者による本邦にある不動産又はこれに関する権利の取得非居住者The duty falls on the non-resident, is owed each time, and runs 政令で定める場合を除き, except in the cases the cabinet order prescribes. Article 12 of the Ministry of Finance reporting order fixes the mechanics: a report in Form 22, one copy, submitted 当該資本取引を行った日から二十日以内に, within twenty days of the transaction, and 日本銀行を経由して財務大臣に, to the Minister of Finance through the Bank of Japan, except where Article 5 of that order applies.
Where the exemption sits, and what it turns on
Article 18-5(1) of the Foreign Exchange Order sets out the cases in which no report is required. Its item (i) is the small-scale exemption. That item reaches 法第五十五条の三第一項第一号から第九号までに掲げる資本取引, the capital transactions listed in items (i) to (ix) of Article 55-3(1), and no further. Article 5(1) of the reporting order then fixes the amounts inside that range, at ¥100,000,000 or less for items (i) to (vi) and less than ¥1,000,000,000 for items (vi) to (ix). Item (xii) is outside the range both provisions work on, so the small-scale exemption does not reach it and no monetary threshold applies to it. Item (iii) of Article 18-5(1) is the residual route: その他法第五十五条の三第一項の規定に基づく報告がされなくても法の目的を達成するため特に支障がないものとして財務省令で定める資本取引. That is where the exemption for real property is placed, in Article 5(2)(x) of the reporting order.
十法第五十五条の三第一項第十二号に掲げる資本取引のうち、次のいずれかに該当する本邦にある不動産に関する権利の取得イ非居住者が当該非居住者又は当該非居住者の親族若しくは使用人その他の従業者の居住の用に供するため行った本邦にある不動産に関する権利の取得ロ本邦において非営利目的の業務を行う非居住者が当該業務の遂行の用に供するため行った本邦にある不動産に関する権利の取得ハ非居住者が当該非居住者の事務所の用に供するため行った本邦にある不動産に関する権利の取得The three exempted acquisitions are described by the purpose the property is put to: an acquisition made so that the non-resident, or a relative, employee or other worker of that non-resident, may live in it; an acquisition by a non-resident carrying on a non-profit activity in Japan for the conduct of that activity; and an acquisition for the non-resident's own office. The distinction the order draws is one of use, and no threshold of price or area appears anywhere in it. Article 5(2)(xx) leaves a residual power with the Minister of Finance to designate further transactions.
Article 71(iii) of the Act attaches a penalty to a failure to report under Article 55-3(1), or to a false report: 六月以下の拘禁刑又は五十万円以下の罰金, imprisonment for up to six months or a fine of up to ¥500,000.
Two limits on this section
Whether any particular acquisition falls within Article 5(2)(x) is not addressed here, and no conclusion about it appears anywhere on this page. The order describes the acquisitions by the purpose they serve, and that question is for the Minister of Finance through the Bank of Japan. Form 22 is also not reproduced or explained: an amending order taking effect on 1 April 2026 changed it, with the earlier treatment preserved for acquisitions made before that date and the earlier form allowed to be adapted for the time being, and the preparation of a report to an authority is work reserved by statute.
This regime was named in an earlier guide on this site as a statute that had not been examined. It has now been read at asof=2026-09-01, and the provisions above are the result.
What this page does not settle
- Nothing here concerns lending decisions. No lender, product, interest rate, income threshold, deposit percentage, residence-status requirement or approval rate appears anywhere above. Those are not statutory matters, no primary source states them, and whether an advance is made and on what terms rests with the lender alone.
- No case law has been read. Every statement above is a reading of statutory, cabinet order and ministerial order text. The reach of Article 370, the operation of Article 388 and the question whether a lease can be set up against a chargeholder are each decided by a court on the facts, and nothing here reports how any court has decided them.
- No insurance is described. Arrangements under which a policy answers for an outstanding balance are products designed by financial institutions and insurers. No primary source sets their terms, and this page says nothing about them.
- Guarantee arrangements are named only where a statute names them. Article 75(ii) of the Act on Special Measures concerning Taxation refers to a right of indemnity arising from a guarantee of the borrowing. What such a guarantee costs, who offers one and on what conditions are not statutory matters and are not addressed.
- Auctions are described only in outline. How long a procedure takes, what properties sell for, how a bid is made and whether any alternative to an auction is preferable are outside this page entirely.
- Ministry of Finance orders under Article 75 were not retrieved. Article 75 makes the one-year registration condition subject to 財務省令で定めるところにより. We read the Act and its cabinet order but not that ministerial order, so the detail it adds is not described.
- The commencement date of the 2003 repeal is not established. The repeal of the Act on Mortgages of Foreigners is recorded in supplementary provisions whose Article 1 leaves commencement to a cabinet order. That cabinet order was not retrieved, and the repealed act is not in e-Gov's index, so neither its contents nor the date is stated above.
- The dates and counts come from one source. The
asofreadings, the word counts and the reproduction of statutory text are measurements of what e-Gov returns. They have not been checked against the official gazette, so an error in e-Gov's data would be an error here. - Our English is a reference rendering. Japanese statutory terms are given in Japanese with a reading and a plain-English gloss on first use. The Japanese text governs.
Our thanks to anyone who has stayed with a page built out of article numbers. Reading a run of provisions in a second language is genuine work, and the time given to it is appreciated. They were gathered for one purpose: so that a question about a charge on a Japanese property can be put precisely, to the lender, the judicial scrivener or the tax professional who is actually in a position to answer it.
Sources
Every statutory, cabinet order and ministerial order text below was read on 1 September 2026 through the e-Gov law search service maintained by Japan's Digital Agency, at the version in force on that date. Where a date or a count is our own measurement rather than something printed in a source, we say so both here and in the body.
Art. 3(2) provides that a foreigner enjoys private rights except where a law or a treaty forbids it. Art. 22 makes the base of a person's life their domicile and Art. 23(2) deems a residence in Japan to be the domicile of a person who has no domicile in Japan, whether that person is Japanese or foreign, subject to the proviso about the law of the domicile. Art. 369(1) defines the charge, Art. 370 its reach with the exclusion of a building on the mortgaged land and the two exceptions in the proviso, Art. 371 the fruits after default, Art. 373 priority by order of registration, and Art. 374 variation of priority with the consent of interested parties and a registration of its own. Art. 375 confines interest and other periodic payments to the last two years, with the proviso for a special registration, and applies the same to damages for default up to a combined two years. Art. 376 is disposition of the charge and Art. 377 the requirement of notice or acceptance for it. Arts. 378 to 386 are payment of the price and the extinguishment claim, Art. 383 listing the three documents, Art. 384 the four events that deem acceptance, and Art. 386 the moment the charge is extinguished. Art. 387 is a registered lease that a chargeholder has consented to. Art. 388 is the statutory superficies, with the rent to be fixed by the court on the application of a party. Art. 389 is the auction of a building put up afterwards, with the priority confined to the price of the land, and its paragraph (2). Art. 390 lets a third-party acquirer bid. Art. 392 is the apportionment where one claim is secured on several properties. Art. 395(1) is the six-month period before an occupier must hand over, in the two cases listed, and Art. 395(2) removes it where the buyer has demanded a month's worth of consideration with a reasonable period and has not been paid. Art. 396 is prescription against the debtor and the party who granted the charge. Arts. 398-2 and 398-3 are the revolving charge and the maximum amount. The supplementary provisions attached to Act No. 134 of 2003 include Art. 5 on leases existing when that Act came into force and Art. 15(i), which repeals the Act on Mortgages of Foreigners (外国人の抵当権に関する法律), Act No. 67 of 1899. Art. 1 of those supplementary provisions leaves the commencement date to a cabinet order within one year of promulgation, and we did not retrieve that cabinet order. Read at asof=2026-09-01.
Real Property Registration Act (不動産登記法), Act No. 123 of 2004 — Arts. 3, 4, 59, 68, 83, 88, 105, 106
Art. 3 lists the ten rights that may be registered, the charge being item (vii). Art. 4(1) makes the order of registration decide priority except where a law provides otherwise. Art. 59 lists the particulars for any registration of a right. Art. 83(1) adds the particulars for a security interest: item (i) the amount of the claim, item (ii) the debtor's name and address, item (iv) the two or more properties where the security covers more than one, and item (v) the limit expressed in Japanese currency where the claim is denominated in a foreign currency. Art. 83(2) lets the registrar prepare a joint collateral schedule. Art. 88(1) adds the particulars specific to an ordinary charge, including interest under item (i) and the agreed damages under Art. 375(2) of the Civil Code under item (ii); Art. 88(2) sets out the particulars for a revolving charge, excluding item (i) of Art. 83(1) and requiring the scope of the secured claims and the maximum amount. Art. 68 permits a cancellation where a third party with a registered interest exists only with that party's consent. Arts. 105 and 106 are the provisional registration and the priority a subsequent definitive registration takes from it. Read at asof=2026-09-01. The character count of this Act's text stated in a linked guide on this site was reproduced by the same method during this work.
Table 1, item 1 is the table for registrations of real property. Sub-item (v) covers the creation of a charge together with the registrations of attachment and restriction listed with it, takes as its base the amount of the claim, the maximum amount or the budgeted cost of the works, and sets the rate at four thousandths. Sub-item (vi) is transfer of a charge at one thousandth on inheritance or merger and two thousandths otherwise. Sub-item (viii) is variation of priority at ¥1,000 for each charge. Sub-item (ix) is the consent registration for a lease at ¥1,000. Sub-item (xiv) is a supplementary or corrective registration at ¥1,000 for each property. Sub-item (xv) is cancellation at ¥1,000 for each property, with ¥20,000 for each application where more than twenty properties are cancelled on one application. Art. 13(2) sets ¥1,500 for each property where one claim is secured over several properties and the application is not the first, on production of the document the Ministry of Finance order prescribes. Read at asof=2026-09-01.
Act on Special Measures concerning Taxation (租税特別措置法), Act No. 26 of 1957 — Arts. 72-2, 73, 74, 75
Art. 75 reduces the rate on the registration of a charge to one thousandth. The relief runs from 1 April 1984 to 31 March 2027, requires an individual, requires a dwelling house within Art. 72-2, requires that the individual has put it to use as a residence, and is confined to a registration received within one year of the construction or acquisition. Its four items name the claims that may be secured and, for each, the person who may take the charge: item (i) the lender of the purchase money, item (ii) the right of indemnity of a person who guaranteed that borrowing, item (iii) the seller where the price is paid by instalments, and item (iv) the Japan Housing Finance Agency in respect of a loan claim it has taken over from a financial institution under Art. 13(1)(i) of its own Act. Art. 72-2 fixes the reduced rate for a first registration of ownership at one and a half thousandths and defines the dwelling house by reference to cabinet order; Art. 73 is the transfer rate of three thousandths and Art. 74 the long-life housing rates. Read at asof=2026-09-01.
Enforcement Order of that Act (租税特別措置法施行令), Cabinet Order No. 43 of 1957 — Arts. 41, 42
Art. 41 defines the dwelling house for Art. 72-2, and through it for Art. 75, as a house certified by the mayor of the municipality or the head of the special ward on the individual's own application, being either a whole house used exclusively as that individual's residence with a total floor area of 50 square metres or more, or a residential part of 50 square metres or more within a divided building of the two kinds described in its items. Art. 42(1) adds, for a previously used house, the requirement in item (ii) that the house meet the earthquake standard or have been built on or after 1 January 1982, and Art. 42(3) confines the causes to sale and successful auction bid. Read at asof=2026-09-01.
Civil Execution Act (民事執行法), Act No. 4 of 1979 — Arts. 59, 63, 82, 83, 180, 181, 188
Art. 180 gives the creditor the choice between auction of the secured property and execution against its revenue. Art. 181(1) allows the procedure to start only on an application in respect of registered security or on production of one of the documents or electronic records its item (ii) lists. Art. 188 applies the rules on execution against real property to enforcement of security. Art. 59(1) extinguishes statutory liens, pledges of the kind described and charges on sale; Art. 59(2) and (3) destroy interests and executions that cannot be set up against the extinguished holders or the attaching creditor; Art. 59(4) leaves the buyer answerable for the claims secured by a right of retention and by the pledges outside paragraph (2); Art. 59(5) lets interested parties agree otherwise by a notified agreement before the standard sale price is fixed. Art. 63 is the procedure where no surplus is expected. Art. 82(1) has the court clerk commission the transfer and the cancellations, and Art. 82(4) puts the registration and licence tax and the other costs of that commission on the buyer. Art. 83(1) is the delivery order and its proviso for an occupier with a title good against the buyer; Art. 83(2) bars the application after six months from payment, or nine months where an occupier within Art. 395(1) of the Civil Code was in occupation. We searched this Act for 国籍 and found it eleven times, every one of them inside 船舶国籍証書 and the related provisions on a ship's certificate of nationality in Arts. 114, 115 and 120. Read at asof=2026-09-01.
Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Act (外国為替及び外国貿易法), Act No. 228 of 1949 — Arts. 6, 20, 55-3, 71
Art. 6(1)(v) defines a resident as a natural person having a domicile or a residence in Japan and a juridical person having its principal office in Japan, and deems a Japanese branch or office of a non-resident to be a resident; Art. 6(1)(vi) defines a non-resident as every other natural person and juridical person. Art. 6(2) leaves an unclear case to the Minister of Finance. Art. 20(x) makes the acquisition by a non-resident of real property in Japan, or of a right relating to it, a capital transaction. Art. 55-3(1) requires the party identified in each item to report each such transaction to the Minister of Finance as the cabinet order prescribes, except in the cases the cabinet order prescribes; item (xii) is the acquisition by a non-resident of real property in Japan or of a right relating to it, and names the non-resident as the reporting party. Art. 71(iii) makes a failure to report under Art. 55-3(1), or a false report, punishable by imprisonment for up to six months or a fine of up to ¥500,000. Read at asof=2026-09-01.
Foreign Exchange Order (外国為替令), Cabinet Order No. 260 of 1980 — Art. 18-5
Art. 18-5(1) sets out the cases in which no report is required under Art. 55-3(1) of the Act: item (i) transactions of a small scale as the Ministry of Finance order prescribes, which by its own terms reaches only items (i) to (ix) of Art. 55-3(1) and therefore not item (xii); item (ii) a class of transaction within item (iv); and item (iii) any other capital transaction the Ministry of Finance order specifies as one whose non-reporting causes no particular difficulty for the purposes of the Act. Art. 18-5(2) leaves the period and the procedure to the Ministry of Finance order, and Art. 18-5(3) lists the matters to be reported. Read at asof=2026-09-01.
Art. 12 requires a non-resident who has carried out a capital transaction within Art. 55-3(1)(xii) of the Act to prepare one report in Form 22 and submit it to the Minister of Finance through the Bank of Japan within twenty days of the transaction, except where Art. 5 applies. Art. 5(2)(x) is the exemption for item (xii): sub-item (a) an acquisition made so that the non-resident, or a relative, employee or other worker of that non-resident, may live in the property; sub-item (b) an acquisition by a non-resident carrying on a non-profit activity in Japan for the conduct of that activity; sub-item (c) an acquisition for the non-resident's own office. Art. 5(2)(xx) leaves a residual power with the Minister of Finance to designate further transactions. The supplementary provisions to the amending order that took effect on 1 April 2026 preserve the earlier treatment for reports on acquisitions made before that date and allow the earlier Form 22 to be adapted for the time being. /api/2/law_revisions/410M50000040029 lists two amendments with an enforcement date of 1 April 2026, Ministry of Finance Orders No. 2 and No. 32 of 2026, the latter carrying the status CurrentEnforced. Read at asof=2026-09-01.
These two acts were retrieved only to count words in them, and this page does not describe what either requires of a lender. Searching the text each returns at asof=2026-09-01, including the supplementary provisions, 国籍 occurs zero times in both. 外国人 occurs once in the Banking Act, in the heading and body of Art. 52-16 on a foreign major shareholder of a bank, and zero times in the Money Lending Business Act. The Money Lending Business Act is at https://laws.e-gov.go.jp/law/358AC1000000032. The counts were taken over the text as e-Gov returns it, with ruby readings dropped and whitespace removed.