Japan is considering offering interest-free loans to people aged 70 and older to reinforce their homes against earthquakes in the wake of a devastating temblor on New Year's Day, a government source said Wednesday.
Under the new plan, borrowers will be able to use their homes and land as collateral to secure loans for retrofitting their residences, while the government will cover the monthly interest payments, the source added.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba has pledged to take steps to make Japan more resilient to natural disasters. On Tuesday night, a powerful earthquake struck the Noto Peninsula again, a region still undergoing recovery efforts from the Jan 1 temblor.
The loans will be repaid by the homeowner's heir after their death, such as through the sale of the property, eliminating the need for repayment during the borrower's lifetime in an aging society, according to the source.
Funding for the measure is likely to be incorporated in a supplementary budget for fiscal 2024 through March next year, as many elderly people in Japan have become more reluctant to quake-proof their homes due to the financial burden.
© KYODO
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sakurasuki
Remember it's a loan to elder, in some banks they refuse to provide loan after certain age for a reason.
What happened after that person died? Don't forget zero interest loan that were given during Covid not only being unpaid, it's undiscovered.
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20241024/p2a/00m/0na/021000c
diagonalslip
sakurasuki
@diagonalslip
So instead those houses becoming cheap akiya, it can become a collateral for loan?
kohakuebisu
Rehousing people following an earthquake costs way more than simple house repairs done beforehand that would stop people becoming homeless. Post earthquake dislocation affects old people's health too, sometimes fatally.
The vast majority of people made homeless in earthquakes are in houses that are leaning a bit but deemed unsafe. With termite damaged parts replaced and more braced walls, far more of them would survive. The mass media always show the most destroyed buildings for dramatic effect, like those company offices that fell over in Noto, and give the impression that lots of houses are completely wrecked. The truth is more mundane and you would need a plumb line to spot the damage to some "completely destroyed" houses.
WoodyLee
"" Under the new plan, borrowers will be able to use their homes and land as collateral to secure loans for retrofitting their residences, while the government will cover the monthly interest payments, the source added.""
Bad idea, so what happens when these victims are unable to pay back their loans?
They lose their LAND, HOME, and their life savings.
This is no different than not giving them anything at all.
Might as well just leave them alone.
WoodyLee
At that age these people will NOT live long enough to pay off their loans, plus they don't have the luxury of that extra income to make the payments, so what will happen the banks will take their LAND & HOMES and sell them there will be nothing left for their kids and grandkids.
This is an ugly scheme that will only benefit the banks and no one else.
kohakuebisu
Many people will lose their HOME if they don't earthquakeproof it. The taxpayer will then have to pay a fortune for them to be rehoused. This fortune is often a huge multiple of the cost of adding a few 2x4 walls that would have saved the house. You can't survive a big shaking with thin unbraced walls made of clay, even if they "breathe" or whatever non-building science traditionalists come up with. Every earthquake proves this.
Alongfortheride
Did you actually read the story? AFTER they die the loan can be paid back with the sale of their home and land.
Alongfortheride
Just so you know there is no such thing and a Earthquake "Proof" house.
Modern houses and older ones with upgrades are only designed to stay up long enough for you to survive.
In a big Earthquake even a brand new house will be damaged.
proxy
Probably would be worth offering interest free loans for better windows with thicker glass and loans for proper insulation.
kohakuebisu
They've been offering massive window subsidies to everyone since Jan 2023. Its called "mado rinobe".
Earthquakeproof here makes lots of sense because those prefabs you see as temp housing cost 6-7 million yen each. That's just for the box. Transporting them and connecting them to electric and water etc. at the school field or wherever they are set up will cost a fortune too.
Abe234
And the article completely ignores the most important thing about this. Come on! You know…… the most important part of any article like this must include the @&¥+€£$
kohakuebisu
This is completely incorrect. Earthquakeproofed houses survive in a completely usable state. Its not an airbag in a car that saves the occupant with the car still a write off.
Its thirty years ago when houses were built less solidly than now, but no 2x4 house ended up as hankai or zenkai in the Kobe earthquake. Like 2x4, most post and beam houses are now braced with structural sheeting (plywood, osb, other fiberboard) and in all of them, the main members in the frame are connected with metal plates in addition to the wood joints Japan is famous for to keep such joints square. It'll might ugly if you don't cover it up, but it is pretty easy to add the same to old houses, provided they are not all termite eaten and falling down anyway.
Desert Tortoise
Not true. A modern wood frame house with sheer wall and the correct fasteners and bracing built on a steel reinforced concrete foundation doesn't fall down in a large quake. They may not even suffer any damage. Our home was completed in 2018 to the latest seismic standards. It survived a M6.4 earthquake late one morning followed by a M7.1 quake the following evening, with non-stop aftershocks in between. My wife described it as feeling like sitting on a pot of boiling water. That second quake was pretty darned exciting too.
Neither quake did any damage to our home. None. Nothing broken. A couple of things fell of bookshelves but that was the extent of it. The self closing kitchen cabinet doors stayed closed so none of our dishes or food fell out on the floor. No cracked stucco. One crack in the drywall of the garage ceiling which we will fix eventually when we can move stuff out of the way. One LED recessed ceiling light sort of slid out of its socket. Pushed it back in and that was it.
Sheer wall makes a huge difference in how well a home performs in a quake. My parents old home was built before anyone thought about sheer wall. During aftershocks you could see the whole house twisting back and fourth. it didn't fall down but everything inside on a wall was chucked on the floor, ceiling lights broke off the ceiling and there was drywall damage inside. I watched our new home during strong aftershocks and it didn't twist at all. It vibrated but no twist. Nothing fell. New homes built to the best modern seismic standards survive big quakes very well.
Desert Tortoise
What you are apparently missing is that the price to retrofit and old home to survive earthquakes is a tiny fraction of the cost to replace the home if it suffers catastrophic damage in an earthquake. $20K up front today can prevent a half million dollar loss later on.
wallace
You cannot compare houses in the US and Japan to those that have withstand earthquakes. Both have different construction methods. Previous Japanese traditional houses were built on dirt, not concrete. Retrofitting a traditional Japanese house for earthquake resistance is complicated and expensive and often not worth it. Termites a re another major problem.
wallace
Replacing the heavy ceramic roof tiles with more modern materials would greatly increase the earthquake proof.
kohakuebisu
M numbers are pretty much irrelevant and what matters is Shindo at the spot of the house, i.e., how much the house in a certain spot actually shakes, not the town hall where the Shindo meter is or wherever the M number happened to be meausred or estimated.
Shindo can be pretty accurately surmised by experts from damage to graves, roads, telegraph poles etc. Such things are built the same way across the country.
Our place survived 6+ or 7 with a few cracks in plaster etc. Everything inside was turned upside down. Our upright piano moved four meters and fell over backwards. Pretty much every piece of crockery got smashed. The experience wasn't remotely fun and felt like we were all going to die. It was impossible to stand up or move. Experts said the land under the house moved vertically by around 1.7 meters. We have damaged plasterboard that is much higher than the furniture which hit it, suggesting it was thrown up into the air.
Desert Tortoise
You have much the same in the US with homes sitting on the ground on what is called a "Cripple Wall", that is guaranteed to collapse in an earthquake. Quite a few homes fell in a northern California earthquake (Napa I believe ?) recently for that reason. There were homes in the San Fernando Valley that fell down in the 1971 Sylmar Quake due to that. Other homes were built sitting on bricks sunk partially into the ground and slid off these "foundations". You have all the same problems in the US. All of these can be remedied for less than the cost of rebuilding the home.
Desert Tortoise
That is a fact !
wallace
Retrofitting old old Japanese houses requires taking it back to the frame. Removal of all mud walls and wood ceilings. Owners need to move out for the duration. I did our house in Nagano and it took me about six months.
iron man
am I seeing an inheritance twist, the loan will be repaid by the heir by selling the property, now the inheritance tax will be increased? admittedly I have not reviewed the IHT situation for a few yrs.
Alongfortheride
If you can build me a new house that is earthquake proof that will have zero damage in an a major earthquake I will pay you double what a building company will charge me. Let me know where to sign the contract.
Alongfortheride
Not correct..like i said above. If you can build me a new house that has zero damage in a major earthquake I will pay you double what a building company will charge me. Let me know where to sign the contract and make it very public. I have also lived through a major earthquake that killed almost 200 people and not one house in a city of 300,000 received zero damage