Building Owner Survey 2015 Discover the mindset and challenges of the small-medium building owners
In April 2014, Xymax Real Estate Institute released a report "Office Stock Pyramid 2014"*1 in which we picked up the fact that the small and medium buildings have reached 90% of the entire buildings in Tokyo 23 Wards in terms of number of buildings and that such buildings are aging. This means that a large part of the buildings in Tokyo's office market will get old and see an increase of maintenance costs and owners will sooner or later decide to sell them or demolish them and construct a new building. However, there is almost no study focusing on the owners of these buildings, such as their age, number of buildings they have, their way of thinking and challenges they face.
For this study, we worked jointly with the laboratory of Professor Yukio Komatsu of the Department of Architecture at Waseda University*2 and conducted surveys and interviews with owners*3 who have buildings mainly in central Tokyo. The results are compiled and summarized in this report.
*2 Laboratory of Professor Komatsu at Waseda University http://www.waseda.jp/sem-ykom/komindex.html
*3 For the surveyed owners, see the survey overview at the end of this report.
Key Findings from Research | 333 owners responded (298 valid respondents), 40 owners were interviewed
1. 90% of owners are over 50 years old. 60% have one or two properties
・About 90% of owners are over 50 years old. (Figure 1)
・Over 60% of owners have one or two tenanted properties (Figure 2)
2. More than 70% fear future of the business. Challenges differ depending on owner's age.
・Many owners said stable income is the attractive part of the landlord business. However, 70% said they fear the future of the business. (Figures 6 & 7)
・Young owners said lack of knowledge and difficulties of gathering information of legal changes are concerns. Senior owners concern about business succession and inheritance strategy (Figure 8).
3. Majority of owners will continue to use the building.
・Over 60% of owners said they will continue to use the building either "as is" or after renovations (Figure 13).
・Owners start considering new construction when the building becomes 30 years of age (Figure 13).
・Only about 10% of owners of one or two properties consider new construction or disposal, lower than that of owners of three or more properties. (Figure 14)
4. Interviews revealed owners' features and challenges
・Features of owners by age group and by number of buildings. (Figures 17 & 18)
・Different backgrounds of challenges and of not being able to decide future plans.
