We’re less than a month away from our move to Japan, and while there are a tonne of things still left on our to-do list, there’s at least one more thing that we can check off: we will have a place to stay in Tokyo. With the help of an agency in Tokyo, we’ve managed to find an apartment in Shibuya, a short 10-minute-walk away from work.
Renting an apartment in Tokyo is a bit harder on the wallet than it is in Santa Monica, as moving in typically requires a security deposit of 2-4 months’ worth of rent, which includes the key money deposit (typically 1-2 months’ rent). Additionally, unlike the security deposit which is normally returned to the renter at the end of the lease, the key money is instead paid to the landlord as a sort of “thank you” for letting you stay in their property.
However, despite our fears that we’d end up paying a fortune in rent to live in a box (Tokyo is consistently named one of the world’s most expensive cities), we ended up finding a place that is double the size of our apartment in Santa Monica, for the same monthly rent that we currently pay.