Header image: a house in Kamiyamaguchi, Tokorozawa, Saitama, photographed in October 2024 by Syced and released under CC0 on Wikimedia Commons. It is not a property for sale.
Akiya Japan or Real Estate Japan? Three English Sites for Houses in Japan Compared
Akiya Japan has by far the most listings and costs US$5 a month for alerts and instant access to new ones. Real Estate Japan showed no fee for buyers and lists apartments and rentals too, posted in English by the agencies. Buy Houses Japan searches detached houses across all 47 prefectures from one sentence, starting without an account.
- Choose Akiya Japan if you want the widest net: houses, apartments, land and municipal akiya bank listings, with sold prices, for a small fee.
- Choose Real Estate Japan if you want to write to the agency in English from the first message, pay no fee, and would also consider an apartment or a rental.
- Choose Buy Houses Japan if you want a detached house outside Tokyo, prefer to describe it in a sentence, or read Japanese or Korean more easily than English.
Published by Buy Houses Japan, one of the three sites compared. We read each rival's own pages on 17 October 2026, linked below, and have not paid for their services. This compares published offers with our product; it is not an independent review.
Browse houses for sale in Japan without an account.
The three sites at a glance
| Akiya Japan | Real Estate Japan | Buy Houses Japan | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What it is | An English search engine over Japanese listings and municipal akiya banks, running since 2020. Not an agency | An English portal where agencies list homes for sale and rent, run by a company founded in 2006 | A search tool for detached houses from supported Japanese portals. Not an agency |
| Size it states | 1,477,000+ properties tracked from 2,666 sources, sold records included. 369,000+ active listings in July 2026 | No count we could check: its search pages are closed to automated counting | 24,635 detached houses with photos, a yen price and a source check in the last 14 days |
| Property types | Houses, apartments, land, rentals, business, akiya bank | Apartments, houses, land, investment, rentals | Detached houses only |
| Cost | Browsing free. US$5 a month or US$50 a year, 3-day trial | We saw no fee for buyers | First search without an account. Explorer free. Homebuyer ¥2,980 a month (about US$19) |
| New-listing alerts | Paid plans: daily or weekly, unlimited | With an account, no fee shown | Explorer: 1 saved search, weekly. Homebuyer: every saved search, daily or weekly |
| How you search | Filters, a map and 90+ feature tags | Area, train line, price and type filters | A sentence in English or Japanese, plus filters and a map |
| Site languages | English and nine more, including Spanish and Chinese | English, Japanese, Simplified and Traditional Chinese | English, Japanese, Spanish, Korean, Traditional Chinese |
| Who you contact | The listing source, or Teritoru, its partner brokerage | The agency that posted the listing | The agent on the original listing |
Akiya Japan figures come from its plans page, read on 17 October 2026, and its llms.txt, read the same day and marked "Last Updated: 2026-07-26". Real Estate Japan's features come from its homepage and for-sale search, read on 17 October 2026, and its founding year from its own 2017 press release. Ours come from our availability page and pricing page the same day.
Our houses for sale on 17 October 2026, prefecture by prefecture
Headline totals mix apartments, land, rentals and sold records, so we counted one thing we can check: the houses for sale on our own pages for six prefectures, on 17 October 2026 between 14:30 and 14:45 UTC. Each prefecture page only keeps homes with photos, a yen price and a successful source check in the last 14 days.
| Houses for sale | Buy Houses Japan |
|---|---|
| Tokyo | 574 |
| Osaka | 774 |
| Kyoto | 698 |
| Hokkaido | 382 |
| Nagano | 310 |
| Wakayama | 791 |
| All Japan, ¥10 million or less | 7,457 |
Wakayama had the most houses of the six on our pages, at a median asking price of ¥8.8 million, and Tokyo had fewer than Osaka, Kyoto or Wakayama.
We did not count either rival. Akiya Japan's search pages are closed to automated counting, so we quote its own July 2026 figures: 179,000+ active house listings, with Tokyo, Fukuoka and Kanagawa its largest prefectures for all property types. That is several times our total, so if coverage is all that matters, Akiya Japan wins. Real Estate Japan's search pages are closed to automated counting too, and we found no count it published itself, so this page gives none.
Where Akiya Japan is the better choice
- Coverage. It says it crawls 2,666 Japanese sources, including municipal akiya banks, and lists apartments and land as well as houses. We do not include akiya bank listings, apartments or land.
- Price research. Its plans page lists comparable sold data and verified land rights (freehold or leasehold) among its features. We show asking prices and the median asking price per m² of comparable houses, not sold prices.
- Price of the paid plan. US$5 a month is less than our Homebuyer plan at about US$19.
- Help buying. It points buyers to Teritoru, a licensed brokerage, and says it charges no referral or finder's fees. We do not arrange purchases.
Know what the free tier lacks. The plans page lists these among what its paid plans include: "Instant listing access, no countdown", first access to new listings, saved properties and daily email alerts.
Where Real Estate Japan is the better choice
- English from the first message. Agencies post their own listings, and its bilingual agent directory lists agencies you can write to in English.
- Apartments and rentals. It lists apartments, investment property and rentals, which we do not.
- No fee. Creating an account, which lets you shortlist homes and set email alerts, showed no charge.
Where Buy Houses Japan fits, and where it does not
- Detached houses outside the big cities. Every prefecture has a public page with its median asking price, the middle half of prices and the share built before 1981. See house prices by prefecture.
- One sentence instead of filters. Write "a detached house in Nagano under ¥15 million with parking" and the search turns it into criteria. Try houses in Wakayama under ¥10 million with parking.
- Checked availability. Public pages drop a house unless its source page passed a check in the last 14 days. See today's counts.
- Japanese and Korean. The site and its guides are also in Japanese, Korean, Spanish and Traditional Chinese.
It does not fit if you want an apartment, land, a municipal akiya bank property or someone to run the purchase. We are not a brokerage: the listing agent or your own professional handles viewings, negotiation and the contract.
Which should you try first?
- You only know you want "a house in Japan": browse houses for sale across Japan or houses under ¥10 million on any of the three, free, and note where the houses you like are.
- You have picked Tokyo: compare the same budget on Real Estate Japan, Akiya Japan and our Tokyo page; only the first two also list apartments.
- You have picked a rural prefecture: compare our prefecture page with Akiya Japan's for the same area, and check whether two ads describe the same house.
- You want alerts: see how a saved-search alert works and what each site charges for one.
If the Japanese portals are still on your list, read whether you can use SUUMO in English first.
Questions about Akiya Japan and Real Estate Japan
Is Akiya Japan free?
Browsing is free. Its plans page, read on 17 October 2026, offers full access for US$5 a month or US$50 a year with a 3-day free trial. Paid plans add instant access to new listings, saved properties, daily or weekly search alerts, sold-price data, hazard and cost data, and advanced filters.
Is Real Estate Japan free?
We found no fee for buyers on 17 October 2026. You can search without an account, and an account lets you shortlist homes, set email alerts and save your contact details for faster inquiries. The agencies that post listings deal with you directly, and the site's footer links to an advertising page for agencies.
Which site has the most houses for sale in Japan?
Of these three, Akiya Japan states the largest numbers: 179,000+ active house listings in July 2026. On 17 October 2026 we had 24,635 detached houses checked at source in the last 14 days. Real Estate Japan's search pages block automated counting, so we give no figure. Japanese portals carry more: SUUMO listed 1,237 used houses in Nagano alone that day.
Are Akiya Japan and Real Estate Japan real estate agents?
Neither is the agent on a sale. Akiya Japan calls itself a search platform and refers buyers to Teritoru, a licensed brokerage. On Real Estate Japan, the agency that posted the listing handles your inquiry. Buy Houses Japan is not an agent either; each house links to its original listing.
Can I get new-listing alerts for free?
Yes, on two of the three. Real Estate Japan's account includes email alerts, and we saw no fee for it. Buy Houses Japan's free Explorer plan emails one saved search once a week, and Homebuyer covers every saved search, daily or weekly. Akiya Japan says alerts come with a subscription.
Start with a search you can repeat
Describe the house in one sentence, check what comes back and save the search when the results look right. Start a house search: your first search runs without an account.
Sources, all read on 17 October 2026: Akiya Japan's plans page, llms.txt and robots.txt; Real Estate Japan's homepage, for-sale search, agent directory and 2017 press release; our availability, pricing and prefecture pages. Prices and counts change daily.