Kim Jaejoong Reveals His Tokyo Home for the First Time on Fun-Staurant

The singer’s spacious Japanese residence offers more than a celebrity-home tour. It reflects a career built across two countries over more than two decades.

Kim Jaejoong is opening the doors to his Tokyo residence for the first time since beginning his entertainment career.

The singer and actor will reveal the property on the August 27 episode of KBS2’s culinary variety program Stars’ Top Recipe at Fun-Staurant. In a preview released by the program, Kim described it as a private space he had never shown publicly during his 23 years in entertainment.

The residence immediately surprised the show’s cast with its scale. Unlike the compact homes commonly associated with central Tokyo, Kim’s property features a large entrance, multiple private rooms and an elevator inside the house.

Viewers will also see his kitchen, bedroom and bathroom. The kitchen is expected to play an important role in the episode because Kim, who is known for regularly cooking on Fun-Staurant, said he also prepares his own meals while working in Japan.

However, the home reveal becomes more meaningful when placed beside the story of how he established himself there.

A Home That Reflects 21 Years in Japan

During the episode, Kim returns to a neighborhood connected to his earliest years in the Japanese music industry. Although he was already successful in South Korea, he recalled having to build recognition again when he entered Japan approximately 21 years ago.

Kim debuted with TVXQ in South Korea in December 2003. The group began its formal Japanese career under the name Tohoshinki in 2005, initially promoting through smaller events before developing into one of the most influential Korean acts in the country.

That progress was gradual. TVXQ had to release Japanese-language music, appear consistently before local audiences and adapt to a different entertainment market. Their eventual rise helped create a foundation for the larger Japanese careers pursued by later K-pop groups.

Kim continued working in Japan after his original group activities changed, first through JYJ and later as a solo artist. His long relationship with the country has included music releases, television appearances and large-scale tours.

The Tokyo home can therefore be viewed as a physical reminder of that career. Its significance is not simply that it is expensive or unusually spacious. It represents the stability Kim built in a market where he once had to introduce himself to audiences from the beginning.

A Solo Career That Survived Major Changes

Kim’s Japanese career has continued through several different phases of the K-pop industry.

His first full-length Japanese solo album, Flawless Love, topped Oricon’s weekly album ranking in 2019. Later that year, his cover album Love Covers won the Planning Award at the Japan Record Awards and was selected among the Best 3 Albums in Asia at the Japan Gold Disc Awards.

In 2023, Love Covers III reached No. 1 on Oricon’s daily album chart. His 2025 Japanese release Rhapsody also debuted at the top of Oricon’s daily ranking, showing that his audience remained active more than two decades after his Japanese debut.

That longevity helps explain why local fans reportedly recognized him while he walked through the neighborhood featured in Fun-Staurant. According to the program’s preview, multiple people approached him for photographs as he reflected on his early career.

The moment connects two versions of Kim Jaejoong: the young Korean singer trying to establish himself in Japan and the veteran artist returning to those streets as a familiar celebrity.

More Than a Celebrity House Tour

The episode still promises the playful curiosity expected from a variety show. Host Boom reportedly stopped the house tour after noticing something unusual and jokingly asked whether another person was living there. Kim immediately denied the suggestion, leaving the program to tease a mystery inside the residence.

Yet the strongest story is not whatever is hidden in the house. It is what the house says about the person who lives there.

Kim has spent much of his career moving between South Korea and Japan while working as a singer, actor and entertainer. He has maintained a substantial Japanese audience through industry disputes, military service and repeated reinventions of his solo career.

His first public Tokyo home tour offers fans a rare look at his private life. More importantly, it provides a visual endpoint to the story he tells in the same episode: a Korean star who once started again from the bottom in Japan and eventually built a second home there.

Kim Jaejoong’s Tokyo residence will be revealed on Stars’ Top Recipe at Fun-Staurant, airing August 27 at 8:30 p.m. KST on KBS2.