Beppu’s transaction data points to a live but not highly liquid market for buying premises: 351 house trades were recorded in 2025, with a median price of ¥27,000,000. Prices are trending up, with a 5-year CAGR of 3.26%, and the old-house median reached ¥20,000,000, suggesting that secondhand stock is not trading at distressed levels.
This profile suits buyers who want an operating base rather than a purely bargain-hunting search. The vacancy rate is meaningful at 13.35%, with 32,980 vacant homes and a high akiya proxy ratio of 0.396, but the akiya mobilization ratio is only 0.00421, so unused stock does not appear to convert into transactions very quickly. Affordability is moderate rather than cheap by local income standards, with a price-to-income ratio of 7.67, while turnover is modest at 0.738 transactions per 1,000 residents. Demographically, this is an older market (27.17% age 65+) with a near-balanced daytime population (day-night ratio 1.01) and slightly negative net migration at -277.
The main caveat is that several signals pull in different directions. Vacancy is high, but transaction flow is not especially deep, so finding a property and closing on one are not the same thing; and although 2025 pricing is strong, the yearly series shows counts have fallen sharply from the 2021–2024 range to 351 in 2025. Also note that vacancy data is from 2023 and migration from 2024, so supply and demographic indicators are not perfectly synchronized with the 2025 transaction snapshot.