Best Place to Live in Japan

[Gulliver]

Where is your dream house in Japan located- and why?

Mine would be somewhere with a mild climate Like San Francisco or London. Never too hot but also no snow. I’m not sure that exists here. Does it? I guess I need two houses- one in Hokkaido and one in Okinawa

[concerned]

Hyogo Prefecture a bit in-land from Kobe. Reasons are

Close to Kobe
Good Cycling in the nearby mountains
Good area for food such as Kobe beef, Awaji close by and famous for Onions, Sasayama nearby famous for for beans (Mame)
Kinosaki Onsen and Arima Onsen close by (Kinosaki famous for crab)
Not too much snow in the winter if any

One concern is it does get a bit hot in the summer, and with the way Global warming is going, guess will only get hotter...

[RetireJapan]

Sendai is about as good as it gets for me. My in-laws' place (that we might inherit eventually) is on the edge of a prefectural park, with a lake and neighbours on only one side, on very hard solid ground. We renovated it completely a couple of years ago.

It would be good to live there.

[hbd]

I'd second that vote for Sendai, but also suggest the wonderful Komagawa region near Hanno, which I've already described as a burgeoning foreign residents' community on the "So who's actually retired in Japan" thread. And of course there's KAWAGOE, which some recent survey (doubtless commissioned by the 市役所）claimed to have the highest gross municipal happiness quotient in Japan! Make of that what you will, but it's true that Saitama gets more days of 晴れ weather than any other Prefecture, and much of it is hard, flattish land that never suffers severe damage from quakes. Moreover there's no coast so a Saitama life is storm-surge and tsunami-free. For more about Kawagoe, once again see one of my early posts on the "So who's ...?" thread.

[Gulliver]

Wow two votes for Sendai. I guess the disaster bad rap is not justified. I will have to check it out.

[pfdsa]

For me it would be Okinawa!
Only lived there for around 1 year and half, but my dream is to go back there. Beautiful beaches, green areas and great restaurants. Also met the most friendly Japanese people in there so far, really felt at home while living in there. Had some skin troubles tho, due to the high humidity and temperature I suppose.

[TJKansai]

Nagano (one of the smaller towns, not the city itself), because of the weather and views, plus fresh fruit and veg.

[RetireJapan]

I really think climate change/natural disasters are going to be a big factor going forward. So Okinawa/Kyushu seem a bit dicey, as does anywhere directly on the coast, near volcanoes, flood plains, landslide prone slopes, etc.

[beanhead]

I love the Seto Nakai area. Nice climate, good food and mostly free of natural disasters.The people in that area speak a little strangely, which takes a bit of getting used to, but a great place . Kagawa, Okayama, Tokushima.

[goodandbadjapan]

Hiroshima and Seto Naikai area for me too. Hiroshima is a great size of city and love all the wee islands in the Seto Naikai.