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2026-09-09

Real estate acquisition tax and registration and licence tax ― the two taxes you pay when you acquire real estate

You bought real estate, received it as a gift, or inherited it. Two taxes attach to the act of acquiring it: the prefectural real estate acquisition tax (不動産取得税) and the national registration and licence tax (登録免許税) paid when you register. For an inheritance, the acquisition tax is exempt and the registration tax is 0.4%. For a gift or a sale, both apply and the rates are higher. This article sets out the rates by cause of acquisition, the reductions for housing, and the exemption for inheritance registration of land valued at 1,000,000 yen or less, as of September 2026.

About this translation ― This page is an English translation of an article originally written in Japanese by KuraLab's operator, a licensed real-estate transaction specialist (宅地建物取引士) and administrative scrivener (行政書士) in Japan. The Japanese original is the authoritative text; where the two differ, the Japanese version prevails. The article explains Japanese law and procedure in general terms as of the date shown. It is not legal, tax or immigration advice for your situation ― please confirm with a licensed professional in Japan. Japanese terms are kept in parentheses so you can search for them. Read the Japanese original

"I was told the tax would be zero." In the consultation room, the daughter sitting beside her mother in her seventies opened with that. She wanted the family home transferred into her name while her mother was still well. An acquaintance had told her that "with the settlement-at-inheritance taxation system (相続時精算課税) there is no gift tax up to 25,000,000 yen," so she wanted to finish it now as a gift. I asked only one thing back: "Which tax are you talking about?" She was quiet for a moment and said, "Isn't it gift tax?" This article is the diagram I drew on paper that day, written out as text.

When you acquire real estate, apart from the fixed asset tax you pay while you hold it, there are two taxes that attach to the moment of acquisition: real estate acquisition tax (不動産取得税) and registration and licence tax (登録免許税). They are separate from gift tax and inheritance tax, and whether they apply, and at what rate, depends on whether you acquired the property by inheritance, gift or sale. The question "is it better to receive it from a parent during their lifetime or by inheritance?" cannot be answered by gift tax alone. Only when you add these two can you compare.

Real estate acquisition tax is levied by the prefecture on the person who acquires real estate. The standard rate is 4%, reduced to 3% for land and housing (this reduction has a deadline and has been extended repeatedly; as of September 2026 it covers acquisitions up to 31 March 2027). The tax base is the fixed asset tax valuation, and the special rule that residential land is calculated at one half of its valuation continues to the same deadline. A tax notice arrives from the prefecture several months after the acquisition. That "several months later" is the trap: it arrives when you have finished the gift registration, relaxed, and forgotten about it.

The most important point here is that acquisition by inheritance is exempt. If you receive a parent's real estate by inheritance, no real estate acquisition tax is charged. It is charged on sales, gifts, exchanges, new construction and so on. If you receive the family home as a lifetime gift, real estate acquisition tax is added on top of gift tax. With an inheritance, inheritance tax is often nil because it falls within the basic deduction, and the acquisition tax is zero in any case. The point made in another article on this site, that "even with settlement-at-inheritance taxation, real estate acquisition tax is separate," has its reason here. The "no tax up to 25,000,000 yen" the daughter had heard was about gift tax, and it was not wrong. But it was one of three taxes.

There are reductions for housing. For a newly built house, 12,000,000 yen is deducted from the tax base (13,000,000 yen for certified long-term quality housing). For a second-hand house that meets the new earthquake-resistance standard (roughly, built on or after 1 January 1982), between 1,000,000 and 12,000,000 yen is deducted depending on the year it was built. For residential land, there is also a deduction from the tax amount under certain conditions. These are obtained by filing a declaration yourself with the prefectural tax office, so when the notice arrives, check whether the reduction has been applied. If you do not file, the notice may come at the unreduced amount.

Registration and licence tax is paid to the national government when you register, either by affixing revenue stamps to the application or by paying online. Here the rate differs greatly by cause of acquisition. An ownership transfer by inheritance is 0.4% of the fixed asset tax valuation. Gifts and sales are 2% as the standard rate, with sales of land reduced to 1.5% (this is also a reduction with a deadline that has been extended repeatedly; check the rate at the time of application in the Legal Affairs Bureau's guidance). A sale of a building is reduced to 0.3% if it is a home you will live in and meets the requirements (lower still for long-term quality housing and the like). Creating a mortgage for a home loan is 0.4% of the claim amount, reduced to 0.1% for housing. Inheritance at 0.4% and gift at 2%. The same change of name, and a fivefold difference.

Inheritance registration has two exemptions. First, inheritance registration of land valued at 1,000,000 yen or less is exempt from registration and licence tax (until 31 March 2027). This helps in inheritances with many low-value parcels, such as rural forest or farmland or shares in a private road. Second, where a person who acquired land by inheritance died without registering it, the registration into that person's name (the intermediate registration in a successive inheritance) is also exempt. This is a measure to move forward the backlog of unregistered inheritances described in another article on this site; the application must cite the statutory basis for the exemption, so follow the guidance in the Inheritance Registration Navi tool (相続登記ナビ).

Back to the consultation. The fixed asset tax statement the daughter brought showed the land of the family home at 12,000,000 yen and the building at 8,000,000 yen. 20,000,000 yen in total. I turned the paper sideways, wrote "inheritance" on the left and "gift" on the right, and listed the two taxes under each. By inheritance, the registration and licence tax is 0.4% of 20,000,000 yen, 80,000 yen. Real estate acquisition tax is zero. By gift, the registration and licence tax is 2%, 400,000 yen. The real estate acquisition tax is 3% of one half of 12,000,000 yen for the land, 180,000 yen, plus 3% of 8,000,000 yen for the building, 240,000 yen, together 420,000 yen. The right-hand column came to 820,000 yen. The left-hand column, 80,000 yen. The daughter said, "That is a different order of magnitude," and her mother asked, "Then should we not do it?"

Put as a table of outcomes for this family home valued at 20,000,000 yen (land 12,000,000, building 8,000,000; as of September 2026): by inheritance, acquisition tax 0 yen (inheritance is exempt), registration tax 80,000 yen (0.4%; land of 1,000,000 yen or less is exempt), total 80,000 yen. By gift, acquisition tax 420,000 yen (land 180,000 plus building 240,000; land 3% × 1/2, building 3%), registration tax 400,000 yen (2%), total 820,000 yen. By specific bequest to a non-heir, acquisition tax 420,000 yen (same calculation as a gift; a general bequest is exempt), registration tax 400,000 yen (2%), total 820,000 yen. By sale, acquisition tax 420,000 yen (180,000 yen if the second-hand housing deduction wipes out the building portion), registration tax 340,000 yen (land 1.5% = 180,000 yen plus building 2% = 160,000 yen; for your own home the building is 0.3%, bringing it into the 200,000s), total 760,000 yen (about 380,000 yen if you use both the second-hand housing deduction and the 0.3% rate for your own home).

So I asked, "Why do you want to transfer the name now?" The answer was that she was afraid the siblings would quarrel after her mother died. If so, there is no need to move it by gift now. If the mother writes in a will "this house goes to my daughter," the daughter can file the inheritance registration alone when the time comes, and the tax is the 80,000 yen in the left-hand column. The three-year deadline under the duty to register inheritances can also be met without hesitation if there is a will. A lifetime gift suits a case where there is a reason to transfer the name now even at the cost of all three taxes: gift tax, real estate acquisition tax and registration and licence tax. For example, the mother's mental capacity is already in doubt and a will would be difficult, or the daughter wants to borrow against the house. This family had neither, and the answer was "write a will and receive it by inheritance."

As a picture of the two taxes for this 20,000,000 yen home: by inheritance, a single bar of 80,000 yen in registration and licence tax. By gift, 400,000 yen in registration and licence tax plus about 420,000 yen in real estate acquisition tax, side by side. The gift-case acquisition tax is estimated as land (12,000,000 yen × 1/2 × 3% = 180,000 yen) plus building (8,000,000 yen × 3% = 240,000 yen); if the second-hand housing deduction applies, the building portion falls. Gift tax is separate.

Let me also describe a case on the exemption side. In another consultation, there were fifteen parcels of forest and field still in the grandfather's name, each valued at somewhere between tens of thousands and a few hundred thousand yen. Two generations of inheritance registration were needed, grandfather to father and father to the client, a so-called successive inheritance. Here both the exemption for land of 1,000,000 yen or less and the exemption for the intermediate inheritance (grandfather to father) applied, and the registration and licence tax on all fifteen parcels came to zero. The application had to state separately "exempt under Article 84-2-3, paragraph 1 of the Act on Special Measures Concerning Taxation" and "exempt under paragraph 2 of the same Article"; that one point we checked with the Legal Affairs Bureau's consultation desk. If you know the exemption, it is one line on the application; if you do not, you pay tens of thousands of yen.

One true story about the "several months later" of the acquisition tax. A man who had transferred land to his son by gift called four months after the registration was complete. "A tax notice has come from the prefecture. I thought I paid everything at registration." What he paid at registration was the registration and licence tax; what arrived was the real estate acquisition tax. The names are similar and the timing is staggered, so many people feel they are being charged twice. At every consultation I now say, "the registration tax at registration, the acquisition tax when you have forgotten about it." I had him check that the one-half special rule for residential land was reflected in the notice; it was, so he paid it as it stood.

Here is an example where filing for the reduction changed the amount. A buyer purchased a second-hand house built in 1990, with the building valued at 8,000,000 yen. Do nothing, and the acquisition tax on the building is 3% of 8,000,000 yen, 240,000 yen. But for housing newly built between April 1989 and March 1997, 10,000,000 yen can be deducted from the tax base. 8,000,000 minus 10,000,000 is negative, so the building portion of the acquisition tax became zero. This deduction applies only once the buyer files a "declaration of acquisition of housing" with the prefectural tax office. A real estate agent may guide you through it, or may not, so if you buy a second-hand house, check the year of construction and ask the prefectural tax office whether a declaration is needed. 240,000 yen is the difference of one sheet of paper.

I have also seen, many times, the mistake of using the wrong figure as the basis of calculation. The fixed asset tax statement shows, for the same land, both a "price (valuation)" and a "taxable standard amount". The registration and licence tax is calculated on the "price", not on the taxable standard amount reduced to one sixth or one third by the residential land special rule. One client had prepared the application using the taxable standard amount of 2,000,000 yen when the price of the land was 12,000,000 yen. Had it been filed as it was, the Legal Affairs Bureau would have asked for a correction and additional stamps for the difference. Rounding is also fixed: drop anything below 1,000 yen from the price before applying the rate, then drop anything below 100 yen from the tax. For land priced at 12,345,678 yen, 12,345,000 yen × 0.4% is 49,380 yen, and the amount paid is 49,300 yen.

Which fiscal year's price to use is another dividing line. If you apply between 1 January and 31 March, you use the previous fiscal year's price; from 1 April onwards, the new fiscal year's price. One person obtained the valuation certificate in March, had the documents ready in April, and had to obtain a new certificate for the new fiscal year. Prices can move at the triennial revaluation (next in fiscal 2027), so be especially careful when you straddle the spring of a revaluation year.

Some land has no price on the valuation certificate: for example, a share in the private road in front of the house, which is exempt from fixed asset tax as a public road. In such cases, the Legal Affairs Bureau's practice is usually to calculate at about 30/100 of the per-square-metre price of nearby residential land, and it asks you to attach a document showing the price of nearby residential land. Practice can differ between bureaus, so check with the bureau that has jurisdiction before applying. It is not unusual for someone registering the inheritance of a family home to list the house lot on the application but forget the share in the private road, and to apply again later for the road alone.

A gift between spouses does not change the two taxes either. When spouses married for twenty years or more gift a home, the gift tax spousal deduction (up to 20,000,000 yen) may mean no gift tax. Even so, real estate acquisition tax and registration and licence tax apply as usual, and for a house valued at 20,000,000 yen the figure is around 820,000 yen, the same as the calculation above (lower if the second-hand housing deduction applies). I have drawn the same diagram as for the daughter at the start for a couple who came in having heard that "with the spousal deduction, the tax is zero."

To sum up: inheritance is "no acquisition tax, registration tax 0.4%"; gift is "acquisition tax applies, registration tax 2%"; sale is "acquisition tax applies (reduced for housing and land), registration tax 1.5% for land and 2% for a building (reduced for housing)". For the same 20,000,000 yen family home, inheritance costs 80,000 yen, while a gift costs 820,000 yen plus whatever gift tax turns out to be. When you consider a lifetime gift, add these two taxes to the gift tax before you compare.

On her way out, the daughter said, "I heard the gift tax was zero and assumed the tax was zero." The most common misunderstanding in consultations is exactly this: taking a statement about one tax as a statement about all taxes. Remember that there are three taxes, not one, and that alone shows you the 820,000 yen difference.

Written by: 長澤 湊（licensed real-estate transaction specialist, administrative scrivener, assistant surveyor）　Content checked on: 2026-10-14

This article is a general explanation of Japanese rules and procedures, not advice on an individual case. Figures and rules are as of the date shown. For your own situation, consult a lawyer, judicial scrivener, tax accountant or administrative scrivener in Japan.

Official sources

The rules and figures in this article can be checked against the following official pages (in Japanese).

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