A few people who wanted to live differently found each other and started buying abandoned homes in rural Japan. This is what happened.
Kiba runs the operations — finding properties, negotiating with local governments, managing renovations, keeping the lights on. Not a visionary, just someone who got tired of paying rent to people who don't care and decided to do something about it.
We're based in Komoro, a small city in Nagano about an hour from Tokyo by shinkansen.
Kiba describes ZuCity's first-year achievements — acquiring four properties within walking distance, establishing community-owned coliving, and generating revenue through events and services while reinvesting profits into infrastructure.
Zuzalu proved that if you put interesting people in the same place for long enough, interesting things happen. We took that idea and asked: what if we just… stayed? What if the popup never popped down?
We're not selling a lifestyle product. We're figuring out how to live together — sharing meals, making decisions, fixing things that break. Every house is an experiment. Most of the experiments fail. The ones that don't become the culture.
A deep dive into ZuCity's first Zuzalu popup city event in rural Japan. The event generated ¥480,000 in revenue while converting 26% directly into community assets like vehicles and furniture.
We pool money, buy cheap rural properties, and own them collectively. No landlords extracting rent. No investors demanding returns. Just people with skin in the game building something that belongs to them.
When you own where you live, you stop asking permission. Our houses become studios, workshops, libraries, labs — whatever the people living there need them to be. The culture comes from the constraints, not the branding.
We decide how things work here. Not a DAO with token voting — just people who live together figuring it out. Messy, slow, human. That's the point.
If you want to see what's actually available, the app has rooms, events, and community listings.
9 million empty homes. Full-sized family houses with gardens going for $5k–$30k. The math is absurd. The opportunity is real.
¥300 ramen. Fresh sashimi from the konbini. Grandmothers who've been perfecting their miso recipe for 60 years. You eat incredibly well here without trying.
Mountains, rivers, hot springs, forests — all walkable from town. Nature isn't a weekend trip here. It's Tuesday.
Neighbors who bring you vegetables they grew. Shopkeepers who remember your name. Genuine warmth that doesn't come with an invoice.
Things work here. Trains run on time. Streets are clean. People hold doors. It's not performative — it's just how things are.
Walk anywhere, anytime. Leave your bike unlocked. Let your kids roam. It's genuinely safe in a way that's hard to explain until you experience it.
We're not running a retreat center for digital nomads. We shop at the same grocery store as everyone else. We go to the matsuri. We help clear snow. Our neighbors know our names, and we know theirs. That's not a marketing angle — it's just what happens when you actually stay somewhere long enough to belong.
A glimpse into daily life at ZuCity Japan — community gatherings, shared meals, and the coliving experience in rural Nagano.