Number of housing construction starts in Japan 2013-2022

In 2022, approximately 859.5 thousand housing starts were initiated in Japan. This represented an increase of 0.4 percent compared to the previous year. The highest figure during the surveyed period was recorded in 2013.

Housing construction in Japan

While the number of residential construction starts slightly increased, the floor area of new construction projects declined. Broken down by type of building, single-family houses accounted for the largest share of constructions starts. Looking at the number of construction starts by type of use, construction starts of owned dwellings decreased by 11.3 percent, while rental housing starts increased by 7.4 percent.

Housing stock in Japan

Japan’s housing stock comprises more than 60 million dwellings, with detached houses accounting for the largest share, followed by apartment buildings. As a result of the demographic development, the growing housing stock already exceeds the number of households resulting in rising vacancy rates across the country. As of 2018, around seven million dwellings were estimated to not meet the requirements of a new seismic code for buildings introduced in 1981, a share of around 13 percent which the government aims to reduce to zero by 2025.