Existing condos in Greater Tokyo now carry higher price-earnings-ratios than new builds

On May 7th, Tokyo Kantei released their 2025 Condominium Price-Earnings Ratio (PER) report, showing that Greater Tokyo Area (GTA) condominium prices are rising faster than rents and further stretching the link between purchase prices and rental income.

The clearest signal is in the resale market. The average PER for 10-year-old existing condominiums reached 31.78, surpassing the 30.46 recorded for newly built units.

Photo by Maria Krasnova on Unsplash 

That means existing condominiums are now more expensive than new builds when measured against the rent they can generate, highlighting how sharply Greater Tokyo resale prices have risen.

For buyers and investors, Condominium PER is a useful way to understand the relationship between property prices and rental income. A PER of 30 means the purchase price is equivalent to roughly 30 years of rent.

The higher the PER, the more expensive the property is relative to its rental income.

The metric does not include management fees, repair reserve contributions, taxes, financing costs, vacancy risk or potential capital gains.

Even so, it provides a simple benchmark for judging whether prices are being supported by rental income, or whether buyers are paying more because of location scarcity, long-term appreciation expectations or other market factors.

New Condominium PER Reaches Sixth Straight Record [H2]

In the GTA, the PER for newly built condominiums rose to 30.46 in 2025, up 1.53 points from the previous year.

This marked the sixth consecutive year in which the figure reached a record high.

Across the 94 stations surveyed, the average price of a newly built condominium was ¥112.12 million, up 9.0% year-on-year. The average monthly rent was ¥292,968, up 3.1%.

Both prices and rents increased, but prices rose much faster. That widened the gap between purchase prices and rental income, pushing the PER higher.

Nearly 70% of surveyed GTA station areas had a new-condo PER of 26 or higher. Specifically, 64 of the 94 stations, or 68.1%, were in this category, up 2.1 percentage points from the previous year.

No station area had a PER below 18.

The highest new-condominium PER was 47.83 at Shirokane-Takanawa Station on the Toei Mita Line. The lowest was 19.40 at Tsudanuma Station on the JR Sobu Line.

GTA Existing Condos Show Even Longer Rental Recovery Periods [H2]

For existing condominiums aged 10 years per the report methodology, the average PER across 260 Greater Tokyo stations was 31.78, up 2.91 points from the previous year; this was higher than the PER for newly built condominiums.

Tokyo Kantei said this reflects the fact that existing condominium sale prices have continued to rise, while rent growth tends to be more limited as properties age.

The shift is significant. A total of 191 stations, or 73.5% of the surveyed total, had an existing-condominium PER of 26 or higher, up 14.7 percentage points from the previous year.

The change over the past decade has been especially sharp. In 2016, only 5.4% of surveyed stations had an existing condo PER of 26 or higher.

By 2025, that share had risen to nearly three-quarters of the surveyed market.

The highest existing condo PER in the GTA was 79.88 at Kamiyacho Station on the Tokyo Metro Hibiya Line. The lowest was 16.40 at Higashi-Matsuyama Station on the Tobu Tojo Line.

Why the PER Matters for Tokyo Buyers [H2]

The Condo PER helps show whether price growth is being matched by rental growth. For investors, a high PER generally suggests lower gross rental yields, because the purchase price is high relative to the rent the property can generate.

As a rough guide, a PER of 20 implies a gross yield of about 5.0%, while a PER of 30 implies a gross yield of about 3.3%, before costs.

Greater Tokyo’s 2025 averages of 30.46 for newly built condominiums and 31.78 for existing condominiums therefore point to compressed income yields across much of the market.

That does not automatically mean these properties are poor investments. In central Tokyo and other highly desirable areas, buyers may accept a high PER because of low vacancy risk, liquidity, location scarcity, lifestyle value or expectations for long-term capital appreciation.

However, from a pure rental-income perspective, the data suggests that prices have moved well ahead of rents.

This is especially important for international buyers who may be comparing Tokyo with other global cities or evaluating whether a purchase can be supported by rental income alone.

For owner-occupiers, the PER can also help frame the buy-versus-rent decision. A high PER may suggest that renting is cheaper than buying from a monthly housing-cost perspective, although many buyers still choose ownership for lifestyle, security or long-term asset reasons.

Methodology [H2]

Tokyo Kantei calculated the Condominium PER using properties registered in its database. Sale prices, transaction prices and asking rents were converted to a standard floor area of 70 sqm and compiled by station area.

In the Greater Tokyo Area, the survey covered 94 stations for newly built condominiums and 260 stations for existing condominiums, defined as 10-year-old units.

Units under 30 sqm were excluded, as were office and retail units.

Further Reading:

Tokyo Kantei 2025 Greater Tokyo Area Condo Price-Earnings-Ratio Report (Japanese only; offers more granular detail then that outlined above; give to your favorite AI-bot for deeper analysis)

Sources:

R.E. Port News (Japanese only)

Tokyo Kantei 2025 Condo Price-Earnings-Ratio Reports (Japanese only; includes PDF links for Greater Osaka & Nagoya)