Toki (property registration)

Toki is the national property registration system run by the Legal Affairs Bureau, where every parcel of land and every building has a record covering its physical description, ownership history, and any mortgages or encumbrances. It matters more than most buyers realize: under Japanese law, when two parties claim the same property, the one who registers first wins — not the one who signed or paid first. That's why your judicial scrivener (shiho-shoshi) files the ownership transfer on settlement day, the moment your money moves. Anyone can pull a registration extract for any property for a few hundred yen, so always check the record yourself before you offer: confirm the seller is the registered owner and look for mortgages or provisional registrations that must be cleared before closing.