How To Check If A Japanese Property Is Held In Trust (信託)

Why the trustee is the owner on the record

Under the Trust Act (信託法), 信託財産 (trust property) means property that belongs to the trustee and that is to be managed or disposed of under the trust (Trust Act Art. 2(3)). The trustee is the person who, under the terms of the trust, carries the duty to manage or dispose of that property and to do what the trust's purpose requires (Art. 2(5)). The beneficiary (受益者) holds a 受益権, a claim against the trustee, not registered ownership of the land.

So there is nothing irregular about one name appearing in 甲区. That is how a trust is supposed to look. What tells you it is a trust is the cause of the entry and the schedule number attached to it.

The trust registration is also what makes the arrangement public. For property where registration is the perfection requirement, Article 14 of the Trust Act says the trust registration is what makes the fact that the property belongs to a trust effective against third parties. Without it, the trust exists between the parties but cannot be asserted against someone outside it.

How it gets onto the record, and where it sits

A trust registration never stands on its own. The Real Property Registration Act (不動産登記法) requires that the application for the trust registration be filed at the same time as the application to preserve, create, transfer or change the underlying right (Art. 98(1)). In the ordinary case, that is the transfer of ownership from the 委託者 (settlor) to the trustee, so both go on together as one event.

The trustee may file the trust registration alone (Art. 98(2)). So may the beneficiary or the settlor, standing in the trustee's place, if the trustee does not (Art. 99).

When the registrar records a trust registration, the Registration Regulations (不動産登記規則) require them to create a trust schedule containing the items listed in Article 97(1) of the Act, give it a schedule number, and record that number at the end of the trust registration entry (Reg. Art. 176(1)). That is the 信託目録第◯号 line. When the trust is varied, the registrar must amend the schedule to match (Reg. Art. 176(3)).

Where the entry sits depends on which right is in trust. For a trust of ownership it is in 甲区, the ownership section. The regulations refer to the 相当区, the corresponding section, because a right other than ownership held in trust, such as a 地上権 or a mortgage, appears in 乙区 instead (Reg. Art. 33(2)).

The trap: a trust with no transfer entry

There are three ways to create a trust in Japan (Trust Act Art. 3): a trust contract, a will, and a written or notarised declaration by an owner that they will themselves hold specified property for a stated purpose. That third form is the 自己信託 (jiko shintaku, a self-declared trust), and it is the one that is easy to miss on a record.

In a self-declared trust the owner does not transfer anything to anybody. They stay the registered owner and become trustee of their own property. So there is no 所有権移転 entry to catch your eye. What appears instead is a 権利の変更 (change of right) entry, which the trustee may apply for alone (Registration Act Art. 98(3)). Reading 甲区 for transfers only, and not for variations, is how this one gets past a buyer.

What the trust schedule actually contains

Article 97(1) of the Registration Act sets out what a trust registration records, and Regulation Article 176(1) puts those same items into the schedule:

1. the name and address of the settlor, the trustee and the beneficiary
2. any conditions for designating beneficiaries, or any method for determining them
3. the name and address of the 信託管理人 (trust caretaker), if there is one
4. the name and address of the 受益者代理人 (beneficiary's agent), if there is one
5. whether it is a trust issuing beneficiary certificates
6. whether it is a trust with no designated beneficiary
7. whether it is a 公益信託 (charitable trust)
8. the purpose of the trust
9. the method of managing the trust property
10. the grounds on which the trust terminates
11. the other terms of the trust

Items 8 through 11 are the ones that matter to you as a buyer. The purpose, the management method and the other terms are where a trustee's authority to sell is set out, and where any condition on it, such as needing the beneficiary's consent or a direction from a named person, is written down. Item 10 tells you when the trust ends on its own terms.

Item 1 is where it gets awkward. Article 97(2) says that if any of items 2 through 6 has been registered, the beneficiary's name and address need not be registered at all. Where item 4 is used, the exemption covers only the beneficiaries that the registered agent represents. The practical effect is that a trust schedule frequently does not tell you who the beneficiary is, and there is nothing improper about that.

The part that bites a buyer

If a trustee sells you trust property that they had no authority to sell, the beneficiary may be able to unwind the sale. For property capable of carrying a trust registration, which includes real estate, Article 27(2) of the Trust Act lets the beneficiary rescind the trustee's act only where both of the following are true:

• the trust registration was on the record for that property at the time of the act, and
• the counterparty knew, or was grossly negligent in not knowing, that the act fell outside the trustee's powers.

Read the two conditions carefully, because it is easy to draw the wrong conclusion from the first one. A trust registration sitting on the record does not by itself cost you the property. It satisfies one of two conditions. The beneficiary still has to show that you knew the trustee was acting beyond their authority, or that you were grossly negligent in not knowing. Whether a particular buyer was grossly negligent is a question a court decides on the facts, and the statute does not say that failing to read the trust schedule settles it.

What the structure does mean is that reading the schedule is cheap and not reading it is the weakest position to be in. The terms limiting the trustee were on a public register, attached by number to the very entry naming your seller, and available for the asking at no extra charge. That is an uncomfortable place to argue from.

Note also what Article 27(2) drops. Under the general rule in Article 27(1), for property without a trust registration, the beneficiary must additionally show the counterparty knew the act was done for a trust at all. For registered real estate that requirement falls away, because the register already says so.

The right does not last indefinitely. It is extinguished if not exercised within three months of the beneficiary learning of the ground for rescission, and in any event one year after the act (Trust Act Art. 27(4)). Read the first limb with the trust schedule in front of you: where a 信託管理人 (trust caretaker) has been appointed and is in office, Article 27(4) substitutes that caretaker for the beneficiary, so the three months run from when the caretaker learned of the ground, not from when any beneficiary did. Item 3 of the schedule is where you find out whether there is one.

If the trustee is buying it themselves

A different and stricter rule applies when the trustee is on both sides. Article 31(1) of the Trust Act prohibits a trustee from moving trust property into their own 固有財産 (personal property), from moving it into another trust they run, from acting as the counterparty's agent, and from other acts where their interests and the beneficiary's conflict.

Article 31(2) lists the gateways: the trust deed permits the act, the beneficiary approved it after the trustee disclosed the material facts, the right came to the trustee by inheritance or other general succession, or the act is reasonably necessary to achieve the trust's purpose and clearly does not harm the beneficiary, or there is a legitimate reason on the facts.

The consequence then depends on which item the act falls under, and the difference matters to a buyer.

For items 1 and 2, the trustee taking trust property into their own hands or into another trust they run, the act is void, not merely rescindable (Art. 31(4)), though the beneficiary may ratify it retroactively (Art. 31(5)). If the trustee has gone on to deal with that property with a third party, the beneficiary may rescind against that third party if they knew, or were grossly negligent in not knowing, of the breach (Art. 31(6)).

For items 3 and 4, which is where a sale to a party related to the trustee sits, the act is not void. The beneficiary may rescind it only if the counterparty knew of the breach, or was grossly negligent in not knowing (Art. 31(7)). Both routes borrow the time limits in Article 27(4), so the three month and one year clocks apply here too.

So the two situations look similar across the closing table and are not the same risk. A trustee buying the property themselves is a transaction that may simply never have had legal effect. A trustee selling to their own relative or affiliate is a transaction that stands unless the beneficiary rescinds it, and whether they can turns on what that buyer knew.

The register reflects this. Moving trust property into the trustee's own personal property is registered with the trustee as the 登記権利者 and the beneficiary as the 登記義務者, so the beneficiary has to be a party to it. The same substitution applies here: where a trust caretaker is in office, the caretaker stands in the beneficiary's place as the obligated party (Registration Act Art. 104-2(2)).

What happens when the property leaves the trust

When a right stops belonging to the trust, by transfer, variation or extinction, the application to cancel the trust registration must be filed at the same time as the application for the transfer, variation or cancellation of that right (Registration Act Art. 104(1)). The trustee may file the cancellation alone (Art. 104(2)).

In a clean purchase out of a trust, then, the trust registration and its schedule reference are struck through in the same event that records you as owner. Seeing that happen at closing is the outcome you want.

A cancelled trust does not vanish from the record system either. The regulations keep a trust schedule for twenty years from the date the trust registration was cancelled (Reg. Art. 28(7)), so a trust that ended in the recent past can still be researched.

Here is a practical way to check before you commit:

1. Order the full registration record and read the cause of every ownership entry, not just the name on the latest one. You are looking for an entry whose cause is 信託, and for a 信託目録第◯号 reference at the end of it. Check 乙区 as well: a 地上権 or a mortgage can itself be held in trust, and the schedule reference then sits in that section instead.
2. Look for variation entries too, not only transfers. A self-declared trust leaves the same person as owner and records a change of right rather than a transfer (Registration Act Art. 98(3)), so a record read for transfers alone can look entirely ordinary.
3. Ask for the trust schedule explicitly. It is not included by default. This is the step people skip without knowing they skipped it. When you request a registration certificate, the fact that you want the contents of the trust schedule certified has to be part of the request (Reg. Art. 193(1)(v)), and if it is not, the registrar omits the schedule contents from the certificate (Reg. Art. 197(3)). On the Legal Affairs Bureau's online registration information service the trust schedule is a selectable option, and the service's own guidance states that the price is the same whether or not you select it. There is no reason not to tick it.
4. Read items 8 through 11 for the trustee's power to sell. The purpose, the management method and the other terms are where you find out whether this trustee may dispose of the property at all, and on what conditions. If a sale needs the beneficiary's consent, a direction from a named person, or the agreement of a trust caretaker, that is where it will say so, and you need evidence that the condition has been met rather than an assurance that it will be.
5. Check the termination grounds against what you actually know. Item 10 records when the trust ends. A trust that has already terminated on its own terms is a different situation from a live one, and who takes the property then is a question for the trust terms and a professional, not for the ownership entry.
6. Work out who the beneficiary is, and accept that the schedule may not tell you. Where a method of determining beneficiaries, a trust caretaker or a beneficiary's agent is registered, the beneficiary's own name can lawfully be absent (Registration Act Art. 97(2)). Ask the trustee directly, in writing, and ask who holds the rescission right under Article 27.
7. Treat a trustee selling to themselves, or to a party related to them, as a stop sign, but do not confuse the two. Both are Article 31 territory, and both turn on whether an Article 31(2) gateway genuinely applies. The consequence differs. A trustee moving the property into their own personal property or into another trust they run is void under Article 31(4), and a later buyer from them can be rescinded against if they knew or were grossly negligent (Art. 31(6)). A sale to a related party is a conflicted act under item 4, which is not void: the beneficiary may rescind it only if the buyer knew of the breach or was grossly negligent in not knowing (Art. 31(7)). Either way, do not work this out yourself.
8. Confirm in writing that the trust registration will be cancelled at the same time as the transfer to you. The law requires the two applications to be filed simultaneously (Registration Act Art. 104(1)), so there is no legitimate reason for the trust registration to survive your purchase.
9. Bring in a judicial scrivener (司法書士) before you sign, not after. Reading a trust schedule and deciding whether a specific sale is within a specific trustee's authority is exactly the judgment they are qualified to make.

The most common mistake is reading the name in 甲区 as though it answered the ownership question. A trustee is a real registered owner with real but limited powers, and the limits are the whole point of the check.

The second is subtler and more expensive: ordering a record, receiving a document headed as a full certificate, and assuming the trust terms were simply not recorded, when the regulation quietly omitted them because nobody asked for them. The certificate is complete on its own terms. It just is not complete in the way you assumed.

What the property registration record can and cannot tell you here:

• What it shows reliably: that the property is held in trust, the trustee's name and address, the settlor's name and address, the date the trust registration was filed, and the schedule number pointing at the terms. If the trust has been cancelled, it shows that too, struck through alongside the transfer out.
• What it shows only if you ask for it: the trust terms themselves. The contents of the trust schedule are omitted from a registration certificate unless the request says you want them certified (Reg. Arts. 193(1)(v) and 197(3)). This is the single most important ordering detail on this check.
• What it may not show at all: who the beneficiary is. Article 97(2) of the Registration Act allows the beneficiary's name and address to go unregistered where certain other items are registered instead.
• What it never shows: the trust contract itself. The schedule records the statutory list of items, including the catch-all other terms of the trust, but it is a filed summary of a trust, not the instrument that created it. Whether a particular transaction is within the trustee's authority can turn on language that was never required to be registered, and on whether the trustee has kept the schedule current as Article 103(1) requires them to.
• How to order the record: use the free lot number lookup to identify the parcel, then order the land registration record for ¥1,500. If there is a building, order the building record too, since land and buildings are registered separately in Japan and a trust can cover one without the other. Both are delivered by email and saved to your account. When you order, say that you need the trust schedule (信託目録) included: as above, the default is to leave it out. Our guide to ordering registration records in English explains the process.

A property held in trust is not a defective property, and trusts over Japanese homes are a normal and often sensible arrangement. It simply means the question "can this person sell it to me" has an answer that is not on the face of the ownership entry. Run the check, read the schedule, and record the result in your Japan property due diligence checklist alongside ownership, mortgages and boundaries.

Where a trust is live, where the schedule conditions a sale on someone's consent, or where the trustee stands on both sides of the deal, confirm the position with the Legal Affairs Bureau (法務局) and take advice from a judicial scrivener (司法書士) before you sign.

FAQ

What does 信託 mean on a registration record? It means the property is held in trust. The person named in the ownership section is the trustee, who is the registered owner in law but holds the property for a beneficiary under terms recorded in a separate trust schedule.

Can a trustee sell me the property? Often yes, but only within the powers the trust gives them. Those powers are recorded in the trust schedule under the purpose of the trust, the method of managing the trust property, and the other terms. A sale may be permitted outright, permitted subject to someone's consent, or not permitted at all.

What happens if the trustee sells without authority? The beneficiary may be able to rescind the sale, but only if the trust registration was on the record at the time and you knew, or were grossly negligent in not knowing, that the trustee lacked the authority (Trust Act Art. 27(2)). The right expires three months after the beneficiary learns of the ground, or after the trust caretaker (信託管理人) learns of it where one is in office, and one year after the act in any event.

Why was the trust schedule missing from the record I ordered? Because it is omitted unless requested. The regulations require the request to state that you want the trust schedule contents certified, and direct the registrar to leave them out when it does not (Reg. Arts. 193(1)(v) and 197(3)). Order again and ask for the 信託目録 by name.

The schedule does not name the beneficiary. Is that a problem with the registration? No. Where a method of determining beneficiaries, a trust caretaker or a beneficiary's agent is registered, the beneficiary's name and address need not be registered (Registration Act Art. 97(2)). It is lawful, and it means you have to ask.

Could a property be in trust without any transfer showing in the ownership history? Yes. In a self-declared trust the owner becomes trustee of their own property without transferring it, which is registered as a change of right rather than a transfer (Trust Act Art. 3(iii), Registration Act Art. 98(3)).

Will the trust registration disappear when I buy? It should. The application to cancel the trust registration has to be filed at the same time as the application for the transfer out of the trust (Registration Act Art. 104(1)). Confirm in writing that this is happening at closing.

Related guides:

• How To Read A Japanese Property Registration Record
• How To Check Property Ownership In Japan
• How To Check If A Japanese Property Has Multiple Owners
• How To Check Inherited Property In Japan From Overseas
• How To Verify A Property Seller Is The Real Owner In Japan
• Japan Property Due Diligence Checklist
• How To Order A Japan Property Registration Record In English

• e-Gov: Trust Act (信託法), Act No. 108 of 2006, current text. Digital Agency e-Gov law database, official. Article 2 (definitions of trust property, settlor, trustee, beneficiary and personal property), Article 3 (the three methods of creating a trust, including the self-declared trust in item 3), Article 14 (the trust registration as the perfection requirement), Article 27 (rescission of a trustee's act beyond their powers, the two conditions for registrable property in paragraph 2, and the three month and one year limits in paragraph 4), Article 31 (the conflict of interest prohibitions, the exceptions in paragraph 2, the nullity in paragraph 4 which reaches only items 1 and 2, ratification in paragraph 5, rescission against a downstream third party in paragraph 6, and the separate rescission-only consequence for items 3 and 4 in paragraph 7, which borrows the Article 27(4) time limits).
• e-Gov: Real Property Registration Act (不動産登記法), Act No. 123 of 2004, current text. Digital Agency e-Gov law database, official. Article 97 (the items a trust registration records, the trust schedule, and the paragraph 2 exemption from registering the beneficiary), Article 98 (simultaneous application, application by the trustee alone, and the change of right for a self-declared trust), Article 99 (application by the beneficiary or settlor in the trustee's place), Article 103 (the trustee's duty to register changes to the registered items without delay), Article 104 (simultaneous application to cancel the trust registration when the property leaves the trust), Article 104-2, paragraph 2 (the beneficiary, or the trust caretaker where one exists, as the obligated party when trust property moves into the trustee's personal property).
• e-Gov: Regulation for Real Property Registration (不動産登記規則), MOJ Ordinance No. 18 of 2005, current text. Digital Agency e-Gov law database, official. Article 176 (the registrar creates the trust schedule, numbers it, records the number at the end of the trust registration entry, and amends it on a variation), Article 193, paragraph 1, item 5 (a request for a registration certificate must state that certification of the trust schedule contents is sought), Article 197, paragraph 3 (the registrar omits the trust schedule contents when the request does not say so), Article 197, paragraph 2, item 5 (the prescribed form for a trust schedule), Article 33, paragraph 2 (the trust schedule number sits in the corresponding section, not only in 乙区), Article 28, item 7 (a trust schedule is retained for twenty years from the cancellation of the trust registration).
• Legal Affairs Bureau: Registration Information Service, about the service (登記情報提供サービスとは). Minkan Shiho Joho Center under Ministry of Justice designation, official service. States that the joint collateral schedule and the trust schedule are requested at the user's option, and that the charge is the same whether or not the option is selected.
• Legal Affairs Bureau: Online registration application system (登記・供託オンライン申請システム). Ministry of Justice, official. The route for requesting registration certificates online.

For a live trust, a sale conditioned on someone's consent, or a trustee dealing with the property on both sides, confirm the position with the Legal Affairs Bureau (法務局) or a judicial scrivener (司法書士) before you rely on the record.