The Unique Challenges of Renting in Japan

Part 1: The pros and cons of renting a room in a share house for foreigners

I lived in a share house which had tatami mats and paper shōji windows. It wasn’t as nice as this image from PxHere though.

In my home country of the UK, renting is a pretty simple affair. It’s not uncommon to be able to sign the contract on the same day as the viewing.

Not so in Japan!

Renting an apartment in Japan can potentially be a long, complicated and drawn-out process, especially so if you don’t have Japanese citizenship.

A hassle-free alternative to this is to rent a room in a share house for foreigners.

In the first part of this three-part article I’m going to discuss the pros and cons of this living arrangement, and explain why renting a room in a share house for foreigners is often a good option for those just starting out in Japan.

Those of you who have been in Japan for a while and have confidence in your Japanese language abilities may want to wait for the second instalment of this article, in which I’m going to explain how to go about renting an apartment from a letting agent, the interesting challenges you may come across, and how to deal with them.

Why share houses for foreigners exist

If you have just arrived in Japan, renting your own apartment is difficult. (Renting an apartment before you have arrived is virtually impossible without assistance). This is because Japanese letting agents generally require tenants to have a Japanese phone, a Japanese bank account, and evidence of an ongoing reliable income from a Japanese company. The upfront costs are often quite high; the letting agent often takes a large fee, and there might be more unexpected additional costs. (See the second instalment of my article for more on this).

On the other hand, companies which manage large share houses for foreigners generally make none of these demands.

For this reason, renting a room in a share house for foreigners is probably your best bet when just starting out.

These houses usually contain multiple rooms, kitchens and bathrooms are shared, the rent is generally reasonable, and the age of the housemates is usually around 20s to 30s.

In the rest of this article I’m going to look at the pros and cons of this type of living arrangement.

The pros

The three main benefits are:

1. Foreign language support (I lived in a room managed by Sakura House, which boasts language support in eight languages).
2. Minimal upfront costs — the deposit is usually reasonable, and there is no “key money” (a common additional cost when renting in Japan).
3. Paperwork is minimal and is processed quickly.

Do not underestimate this last benefit! Applying to rent an apartment in Japan from a letting agent can be a very lengthy procedure, often involving a complex three-way negotiation between the applicant, the letting agent and the landlord. It is very common for prospective tenants to be refused for the various reasons, such as:

• You don’t have a stable, permanent, full-time job.
• You do have a stable, permanent, full-time job, but it’s for a company the landlord has never heard of and/or doesn’t consider reliable/reputable.
• You’re not Japanese (yes, really). For those of you wondering if there aren’t anti-discrimination laws — there probably are, but landlords do not have to disclose their reasons for rejection.
• You are unable to provide a guarantor. This is someone who is legally obliged to pay your rent if you skip town and disappear. Usually they have to be a Japanese citizen in full-time employment, and often they must be a family member, so good luck with that! Needless to say, this can be one of the biggest hurdles for foreigners.

Companies that manage share houses for foreigners require none of this bureaucracy. In many instances you can get everything sorted before you arrive in Japan. Then when you arrive all you have to do is stop off at the company office, sign a few documents, pay the deposit, receive your key, and go to your new home.

I rented an apartment from Sakura House. Overall I had a good experience with them. The house was safe and the communal areas were cleaned regularly by someone from the company. There was a rota system for the housemates to take out the garbage, which prevented arguments. When I got to my room the main lightbulb was initially broken; I rang the company and they sent someone to change it that very day.

Another benefit of this kind of living arrangement is that the household will probably be very diverse. It’s a great opportunity to get to know different people from all over the world. These types of houses tend to be very social; I have a lot of happy memories hanging out in the kitchen with my housemates, cooking together, etc.

When it comes to making friends, one thing to be aware of is that share houses towards the centre of Tokyo tend to be popular with people on a tourist visa who typically only stay a month or so. Houses further away from the centre tend to be inhabited by those staying in Japan longer-term (the rent is cheaper). If you want a more stable household dynamic, with greater potential to form long-term friendships, I recommend choosing a house in a less well-known area, further away from the centre of town.

The cons

The following is based purely on my own experience with the aforementioned Sakura House company.

1. The kitchen was small, and shared between 10 housemates. It got VERY crowded in the evening.
2. The house was old (by Japanese standards). Living in a 40-year-old house didn’t seem like that big of a deal to me at first, but after the first few earthquakes I realised that living in a rickety wooden structure means that you feel every little tremor. Obviously there are also safety considerations, and Japanese people quite sensibly prefer to live in newer buildings which comply with more modern earthquake safety standards.
3. There was a slug in the bathroom.
4. There was a strict policy regarding guests staying the night. I can’t remember the details, but I think you had to pay 2000JPY per guest, per night, and they couldn’t stay for consecutive nights. I guess the company is trying to stop tenants from living two people to a room but paying for only one.
5. The house was about 20 minutes’ walk from the nearest train station. This might not sound like much, but in a city like Tokyo in which everywhere is accessible by train, this can make a big difference (especially when it comes to the morning commute).

Options

As I mentioned, I rented a room with Sakura House, which operates share houses in Tokyo, Kanagawa, Kyoto and Izu.

There are other companies which provide similar services, for example:

C’s Share house (based in Osaka)

Oak House (offers accommodation in Kantō, Kansai and Kyūshū)

Xross House (Kantō and Kansai)

Borderless House (Kantō and Kansai). This one advertises itself as having a mix of both foreign and Japanese housemates.

Changing times?

At the beginning of this article I mentioned two options when it comes to renting your own place in Japan: renting a room in a share house for foreigners, or renting an apartment from a letting agent.

The latter of these two options can be long, complicated and bureaucratic, which is precisely the reason why share house companies came into being in the first place.

However, with increasingly larger numbers of foreigners moving to Japan, some share house companies are providing services in which they offer not only rooms in share houses, but also individual apartments, much like a letting agent.

The above listed Oak House and Xross House seem to provide this kind of service. The choice of apartment is not as great as you would find with a typical letting agent, but given that these companies provide foreign language support and are familiar with the difficulties foreigners face when renting in Japan, this seems like a valuable service.

I’d be interested to hear anyone else’s experiences with this kind of service.

Conclusion

Overall, my experience in a share house was positive, and I would recommend it to anyone just starting out in Japan.

Obviously it’s not for everyone, and if you don’t like living in very close proximity to about ten other people then it’s probably not your cup of tea.

If you have a full-time job, confidence in your Japanese language abilities, and you’re going to be in Japan for the long haul, you might want to try finding an apartment from a letting agent. It will almost certainly take a lot more effort than in your home country, but it can be worth it because Japanese apartments are generally modern, clean, safe and well-maintained.

In the next part of this three-part article I’ll explore exactly how to go about doing this.