Housing
Housing is another headache for many foreigners coming to Japan. Japanese housing customers are quite unique compared to other countries, the firsts comers to Japan often find it difficult to settle in their home in Japan. One of the tough requirement is that most landlord requires a guarantor to lease the property. Although tenants pay securities deposits which is usually two months rent, the landlord requires a guarantor in case of issues with tenants. Finding a guarantor is sometimes difficult for foreigners unless the their employers are willing to sponsor home for employees.
Another unique custom and yet annoying for many foreigners to rent a house in Japan is key money. Key money is basically nonreturnable gift money given to the landlord and it is in general worth of two months rent. Tenants also need to pay a real estate agent commission fee which is usually one month rent so renting a house in Japan is quite expensive.
These issues are not relevant for expatriate employees coming from overseas head office. A relocation team in Japan prepare everything based on the expatriate employees' request for desired location, size, layout and any special requirement such as pets. The company usually make a corporate contract with the landlord and pay everything on behalf of expatriate employees. Although my expatriate boss didn't have to go through finding a guarantor or complicated paper work, he was not sometimes satisfied with big house in Tokyo as he still thinks it is not sizable enough to accommodate a swimming pool and a garage to park 5 cars.
