One of Australia's largest real estate and property brokers to enter Hokkaido market.

One of Australia's largest real estate brokerage houses, L.J.Hooker (LJH) is entering the Hokkaido real estate market. It was announced recently that they will be starting business in Hokkaido from early next year. Due in large part to the prospering Niseko region, foreign interest in Hokkaido property and real estate has been judged to be extremely high. LJH is looking to open 35 franchises in Hokkaido and a total of 70 throughout Japan within 3 years.

L.J. Hooker was founded in 1928 in Sydney and operates more than 800 offices throughout Asia, Australia, and New Zealand. Dealing in homes, resorts properties, and office space, they've also set up an online brokerage. Even in the big world of real estate brokerage, LJH's scale is massive.

LJH established LJH International Property Service Japan in Tokyo as a corporation in April of this year. LJH plans to do business throughout Japan, but has first set its sigthts on Sapporo.

An office is now being built in Sapporo's Minami-ku and will be opened in January with an eye towards recruiting franchisees. Not limiting themselves to the foreign market, LJH will also market directly to the Japanese market. The Sapporo office manager stated, "The interest is Hokkaido property estate is high not only in Australia, but also in Taiwan and China. Our network will support that."