Photo/Illutration Tourists pose with Yayoi Kusama’s 'Yellow Pumpkin,' one of the iconic artworks on Naoshima island, on Oct. 29, 2023, in Naoshima, Kagawa Prefecture. (Shota Wada)

NAOSHIMA, Kagawa Prefecture--A surge in newcomers and a rebound in tourism have pushed up residential land prices and created a housing shortage on Naoshima, an island known as a “sacred place for contemporary art.”

Naoshima town, which consists of remote islands in the Seto Island Sea, including Naoshima, was the only municipality in Kagawa Prefecture where land prices increased year-on-year to July 1, 2023, according to prefectural government data.

One reason for the rising demand on Naoshima island stems from its connection to the art world.

The Chichu Art Museum, designed by architect Tadao Ando, opened on Naoshima island in 2004. Since 2010, the island has been a main venue for the Setouchi Triennale.

Naoshima island has also been featured in international travel magazines as a hot tourist destination. Many people who visit the island as tourists end up wanting to stay permanently.

Masaaki Yamagishi, 45, president of real estate company Naoshima Fudosan, moved to the island from Tokyo eight years ago.

“This is a place where you can live your own life, which you cannot experience in the city,” he said about the appeal of Naoshima.

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Asahi Shimbun

The population of Naoshima town was 3,016 in 2022, which represents a decline from 3,223 12 years ago. But the number of newcomers is rapidly increasing and starting to overwhelm the supply of real estate.

According to the prefectural government, 36 people moved to the town in fiscal 2015, but the number jumped to 104 in fiscal 2022.

Over the past five years, around 500 people have relocated to the town.

Most of the newcomers are married couples in their 30s and 40s, followed by single people in their 20s.

In June last year, Naoshima Colors, a “vacant house bank” operated by the town government, said on its website it was accepting applications for a rental housing unit in Naoshima town.

It was the first time in about two months for housing to become available.

Applications flooded in, and a tenant was selected within a few days.

Yamagishi, a former member of a regional development cooperation volunteer group, and others founded Naoshima Colors in 2015.

In the town, vacant houses had long been traded at the seller’s asking price.

With Naoshima Colors, the town aimed to create a system to provide information on available properties on its website and promote the buying and selling of the homes at “fair prices.”

Ultimately, the Naoshima government wanted to lower the hurdles of finding a place to live and to promote migration.

About 30 vacant houses in the town have been registered with Naoshima Colors so far. As of mid-November last year, all but the “shared house” properties had been sold.

In recent years, there have been times when only one property has been available in six months. Some people have waited three years to find property in Naoshima.

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Foreign tourists wait in line at a rental bicycle shop near Miyaura Port, a gateway to Naoshima island, Kagawa Prefecture, on Nov. 16, 2023. (Shota Wada)

Demand is also rising because hotels on the island have increased their workforces to deal with the recovery in tourists from abroad following the COVID-19 pandemic.

In December, the foreign-affiliated luxury hotel operator Mandarin Oriental announced plans to open a hotel on Naoshima island in summer 2027.

The hotel, which will be built in the style of an old private house for the wealthy, will have 22 rooms, including the main building with two above-ground stories and three detached buildings.

Its restaurants, spa and gym are expected to further increase the working population in Naoshima.

To improve supply, the town created residential lots and sold 12 of them in fiscal 2019.

Naoshima town will also focus on finding unclaimed and unused properties, with the help of the regional development cooperation volunteers, and make them available on the market.

“Naoshima, like other depopulated areas, is facing problems of a declining population, falling birthrate and aging population, and young workers are in high demand,” said Kosaku Maeda, head of the town government’s city planning and tourism division. “The key is how to increase the number of permanent residents, and finding vacant houses is an important issue for the town.”

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