Although Yoshimasa insisted on his deathbed that be succeeded by the head of Iwasaki Domain due to the extreme youth of Yoshihiro, a number of his senior retainers strenuously objected and insisted that Yoshihiro be recognized as daimyō.

He was received in formal audience by Shōgun Tokugawa Ienari in 1824 and his position was confirmed.

In 1836, the domain petitioned that he be accorded the courtesy title of Sakonoeshōshō as this had been hereditary to the Satake clan; however, the shōgunate refused, as the previous four generations of Satake daimyō had all died relatively young and had not be awarded the title.

Although his father Satake Yoshimasu had been a great leader who had made giant steps to reform the domain and its finances, Yoshihiro's youth, inexperience and obsession with a vanity title, combined with repeated crop failures plunged the domain back into massive debt.

Although Yoshihiro imposed sumptuary laws, crackdowns on illicit trade and violations of domain monopolies, and land reclamation around the Oga Peninsula, expenses continued to mount due to increasing demands from the shōgunate to bolster Japan's northern defenses.