Since 2020 the flood hazard map position of a property has formed part of the explanation given before contract. That duty covers water: river flooding, inland water and storm surge.

It is a duty to show you where the property is on the map. It is not a duty to assess the risk or tell you what it means. Landslide and tsunami appear only as to whether a formal alert zone applies, and liquefaction and earthquake sit outside the explanation entirely.

These guides cover what the maps record, what they do not, and what each hazard means for the building and for you as its owner.

The maps and the disclosure

• Japan's hazard maps: what your broker must show you, and what they don't. What is disclosed before contract, and how to read the rest yourself.

Earthquake

• Two dates decide how a house behaves in an earthquake. The 1981 and 2000 structural thresholds, and the Kumamoto survey.
• Insuring a house in Japan that nobody lives in. Why an empty house may not be able to carry earthquake cover.

Wind, rain, snow and slopes

• The morning after a typhoon, the damage is not where you are looking. Inspecting twice, and the three-year insurance claim limit.
• The wall holding up the land is part of what you are buying. Retaining walls, weep holes, and landslide designations.
• Owning a house where it snows properly. Snow load, roof clearing and frozen pipes.

When the damage reaches somebody else

• When your Japanese property injures somebody else. Why the owner is liable for a wall or roof that falls in a storm.

If you are earlier in the process, start with the full guide to buying property in Japan as a foreign buyer.