by panny | 2025-09-05 01:53:48+00:00
>What criteria do you have in mind when you say "of better quality"?

The builds are superior and so are all the appliances inside the home. Let's compare,

American - Japanese

Hole in the ceiling with wires hanging out - standardized ceiling sockets which can plug in and out different light fixtures and support their weight. Every light fixture in the country can fit the same socket.

Cheap asphalt shingles - Standing seam metal roof with heated embedded gutters (this roof, with no heating, in the US costs more than the whole Japanese house)

Tank water heater, runs out of hot water, fills up with sediment - Tankless water heater with adjustable temperature control panel, never runs out of hot water

Primitave toilet, leaks, just jiggle the handle! - Toilet with heated seat, bidet, hand washing sink in the top of the tank, eco and full flush options, plays privacy music, motion detector lifts the lid to greet you, automatic flush when you stand, and a wireless panel to control all this on the wall beside it.

Washer, dryer requires 220V special plug and a vent hose that is a fire risk, seperate units - ventless washer and dryer in one unit no bigger than a single American unit, washes and dries 6Kg loads (twice that if just washing), self cleaning. Just throw your clothes in, come back later to clean dry clothes. Space efficient and all it needs is water, a drain, and a standard two prong plug.

Central HVAC system requing expensive dust collecting ductwork, not energy efficient - quiet minisplit, inexpensive to purchase, install, and operate. Doesn't blow dust everywhere.

Winterizing? You need to call a plumber, pay him several hundred dollars, takes hours because your tank hot water heater is full of sediment, he blows compressed air into the pipes blowing nasty crap all over your sinks where it will stay since there's no way to wash it until the water is turned back on - All plumbing is routed with zoned cutoff valves. Each zone has a spigot at the lowest point in the house. Turn off the zone, open the faucets, then open the spigot for that zone. Gravity drains the water out of the pipes and into a drain out to the sewer. Winterize the entire house in 30 minutes flat with nothing more than a pipe wrench.

Shallow bath tub, which will empty your tank water heater in no time. But you'll never really use it because you have to sit in a tub full of your own filth, gross - Deep bath tub you can fill with your tankless water heater, hot water up to your neck, room for two. the shower head is beside the bath, not in it and the entire bath is a wet room. You clean your dirty filth off with the shower before getting into the clean bath water. The bath has massage jets and a reheater so you can warm the water back up if you just feel like soaking in it for hours.

Electric stove, maybe gas. Low tech, burns your house down. - IH cooker. Easy to clean, turns itself off if it detects you left it on with no pan or an empty one.

>They are not built for longevity

Immediately after WWII, they were not, because the country was destroyed and people needed houses fast. Those houses are all gone now. The ones standing today are very well built. Better built than houses in the US. It comes down to a lot of little things. The technology is better and the entire layout of the home makes much more sense in Japan. It all works together in harmony, and you really feel it once you come back to America. Here you spend so much time cleaning and dusting and moving laundry around the house and never really warming up with a nice bath and always a dirty feeling butt because you just have toilet paper and just wanting to go back to Japan because you've experienced a much better standard of living there. But you're here now in a house that cost 10x as much, but it feels like you're camping in a tent by comparison.