Finding an Apartment

Spring Revival Series #2


Moving to "Little Mountain" in Tochigi...

You may not want to live here, but you may not have a choice...

On my previous post of the Spring Revival Series, it was said that spring is a time of change in Japan. Towards the end of March, besides plane loads of foreigners coming to start their new careers as ALTs, many more Japanese and ex-pats are changing jobs. This means finding a new place to live and moving (hence a good time for the cardboard industry and secondhand stores).

I'm in the same boat this year: I got out of a big ALT dispatch company and went direct-hire (maybe I'll make a post on this topic). The benefit of being employed by a company is that it took care of my housing. At the start, I just showed up at the real estate agent's office and the paperwork was ready to be signed and stamped, with a company-assigned Japanese helper in tow. When something needed to be fixed, I emailed the company and it took care of everything. When I moved out, the company arranged for the real estate agent and all the utilities to close things out.

Life was easy... Going on my own was very different.

Going direct-hire comes with much higher pay and getting legally required employer's benefits (yes, I didn't get those with a dispatch company), but unless specified, I am on my own for housing. No help from my new BoE.

When I was sure that I got the new job at the end of February, my wife started the apartment search. Since we both had work until mid-March, all we could do was looking online. My understanding of written Japanese is limited, so I first looked on Gaijinpot, but it was useless since I'm not moving to the main foreigner hubs of Tokyo and Yokohama. Chintai, Suumo, and similar Japanese sites became our best friends.

Before we head down south to look in person, my wife made appointments with a few big-name real estate agencies - Daitou Kentaku (大東建託), House Komu (ハウスコム), and Able Network (エイブルネットワーク). We decided on specific places, a price range, and a "wish list" of things we want in an apartment. I wanted to think that we were ready to take on our new city. I even bought a tape measure from Daiso, at the suggestion from my wife.

The "Wish List":

• 2LDK
• Similar rent to my apartment in Miyako (~55,000 yen)
• No reikin (basically, "thank you" money to the landlord for allowing me to rent with him/her)
• No more than 1 month's deposit
• No tatami room (mats cost ~10,000 yen each to replace, either taken out of my deposit or paid out-of-pocket before move-out... imagine how much for a room with 6, 8, or 10 mats!)
• At least 1 parking spot included
• In a convenient location

The Experience:

Day 1

We started our mid-March weekend with Daitou Kentaku. We were greeted politely, in the usual Japanese fashion, by our assigned agent, who was this rather tall Japanese woman. While we waited, we were offered tea and coffee. I let my wife take care of all the talking, since it's all in Japanese. Also, I've read a lot about housing discrimination on foreigners in Japan, so I made a point to keep my mouth shut and only nod at strategic moments of our conversations. Before we left the office to look at places, we had to drop the bombshell: I, the primary renter, am a gaijin. I could sense a slight change in tone, some uncertainty, and a little more discussion between the agent and my wife. In the end, our agent confirmed that the landlords didn't have a problem with my status.

We went to 2 places in the agent's car. Both were nice apartments but we found something "wrong" with each. On the 1st place, we spotted some shifty looking kids playing soccer outside. My wife had the sharp eyes and caught some graffiti on the mailbox: Shinu ("Die" in Japanese), implying something may have gone wrong with the previous resident(s). In the 2nd place, the room spaces were oddly arranged, and the building was next to a farm, with lots of bugs flying around outside already in March. We weren't too satisfied with the selection, but the day had just started, so we decided to move onto the next agency.

Next, we went to House Komu. Again, I allowed my wife to do all the talking. After looking at our options, my wife had to tell our agent that I'm a foreigner. Then, there was a clear change in tone. Although the agent said it should be fine, the service noticeably became less friendly, although everyone didn't seem particularly friendly to begin with. The agent sent another guy to take us around, and all 3 units which we were shown were odd and poorly maintained, almost falsely advertised compared to the listings online. The 1st one was nice and modern, but had many obvious signs of wear-and-tear and broken things. The 2nd place looked like hippies may have lived there; one room had this 1970's style brick-red sheet tile flooring while other rooms had hardwood floors. Plus, it had a huge gravel garden, and it's next to a small industrial warehouse. The 3rd place... let's just say that both my wife and I wanted to run away as soon as we walked in, but we tried to be polite and entertained our agent by pretending to look through the rooms. Throughout the tour, our agent/driver hardly said anything. Hell, at least the woman from Daitou Kentaku made conversations with us in the car.

Back at the office, I felt like the agents were pressuring us to apply for one of the apartments (the 1st place, or the least shitty one). But they were right - the application held the place for us while we used the next day to explore other options, plus we could always cancel it. Also, they suggested the rental contract to be under my wife, but with me as the primary breadwinner, we/they didn't have a choice. Hands down, House Komu didn't win the best service award from us that weekend.

We would try our luck the next day.

Day 2

The night before, I told my wife that I would conduct a little experiment - instead of keeping my mouth shut, I would throw in some Japanese to see how we (I) would be treated. We had a little problem getting to Able Network; Google Maps kept taking us to the back of the building, so we drove in circles for 10 min. Our agent today was this overweight Japanese man with a very high-pitch talking voice, but he was very friendly. This is good sign #1. When we dropped the foreigner bombshell on him, he also said that it should be fine, in the same high-pitch voice, but he would need to formally confirm things after the viewing. Good sign #2. Further, as we looked through the listings at the office, our agent would tell us important info about the apartments, the landlords, etc. And this is after he found out I'm a gaijin. Good sign #3.

The 1st place we went to was actually in the same apartment complex as the 1st place we saw with House Komu, just the next building over. But the difference was remarkable. This apartment was clean and well maintained, e.g. no broken outlets or patches of scratched-off paint on the door edges. The 2nd place was just as remarkable. It was in a quiet but convenient neighborhood, and it was clear that the landlord cared about his buildings, since many things were recently added or replaced. Both places were in the most convenient neighborhood in town, at the price range we wanted, while the agencies yesterday said that it couldn't be done. We didn't know which one to take, but we knew we would take one of the two today.

Back at the office, we made our decision: we chose the 2nd place. Sure, the 1st place has electronic locks and is 1-min walk from a Spanish restaurant (yes, that's right). But the other place was just as nice, and it's within walking distance to everything we need to live (other than work). With a few hours left before the journey back to Miyako, we were very happy and relieved that we didn't give into desperation.


The Cliffhanger:

Just we breathed a sign of relief, we ran into problems... again, due to my gaijin-ness. Apparently, (1) giving the impression (or illusion) of Japanese fluency and (2) being married to a Japanese woman weren't enough. From the answers and expressions of our agent on the phone with the landlord, it wasn't good news. He even went to the back of the office to talk on another phone, away from us.

* For any Japanese readers, in the West, when someone doesn't want you to listen in on a phone conversation, he/she also goes to a more private phone to talk.

Then, the agent came back to ask me what I do/will do for a living. Apparently, being an English teacher was the final power-up that I need - all was well after he told the landlord.


The Surprises:

The man always has ways to get your money, and the same is true in Japan. You may think you are saving some money by going "no reikin" or no tatami, but the fees will come in other names. Cleaning fee, the "optional" lock changing (it's not something we want to risk, so it's not really an option), management fee, no-guarantor-needed fee (even though we had asked my wife's dad to be one). And of course, the real estate agency needs its cut, which comes in the broker's fee. Luckily, we came at a good time, during a promotion when the broker's fee is waived, but we had to stay at this apartment for 2 years... no problem.

Since we had to pay for this month's and next month's rent (thank goodness, not on the spot), it's about 220,000 yen (~$2,000) to start a new life in Tochigi. By the way, this is an unfurnished apartment...


The Closing:

After filling more paperwork and getting a phone call from some lady, we would still have to wait for our application to be approved, which takes a day or so. I mean, it was Sunday. Meanwhile, my wife called to tell the other real estate agencies that we weren't interested anymore, in the usual ultra-polite, keigo-ridden, soft-voiced Japanese phone mannerism. Off to a late lunch and a long journey back.


Looking back...  If you don't want the hassle of finding your own place, and you can live on your lower pay, and your school situation is good, stay with your dispatch company (can't believe I said it).  You may not need semi-fluent Japanese to do your job, but you need it for everything else.  If you are brave and/or ambitious enough to go on your own, and you are single, go with a Leopalace.

For me, if I didn't have a Japanese wife or wasn't a "teacher", getting an apartment was likely impossible.  Not everything is a dream in Japan...