RUSUTSU, Japan — As a Japanese couple teed off on a sweltering summer morning here in Rusutsu, a mountainous village in northern Japan, construction workers were building a new luxury condominium complex overlooking the fairways and ski slopes in the distance.
When it opens in December 2020, the 10-story complex, the Vale Rusutsu, will have 156 units at prices from $656,050 for single bedrooms to about $5.2 million for elaborate penthouses. That’s an eye-popping amount for Hokkaido, Japan’s sparsely populated northernmost main island, but the developer, Kamori Kanko, is banking on a growing crop of investors, as well as ski and golf enthusiasts, from Asia to make the $131 million project profitable.