The same family apartment, with an agency fee as low as ¥0

Yes. Whenever the landlord pays an advertising fee (AD) on the listing, the agency fee is ¥0 regardless of the floor plan or the rent. Kurabeel is paid by the landlord rather than by you, so the mechanism is identical for a 1K and for a 3LDK. Because the agency fee is one month of rent plus tax, the amount you avoid is larger on a family apartment: ¥198,000 on a rent of ¥180,000. Listings with no advertising fee cannot be brought to ¥0 and you may have to pay part of it.

Four to five months of rent is the usual range. It is made up of one month deposit (shikikin), one month key money (reikin), one month of rent in advance and one month agency fee plus tax, with fire insurance, a lock change and a guarantor company fee on top. On a ¥180,000 2LDK that is roughly ¥720,000 to ¥900,000, of which ¥198,000 is the agency fee. Movers and furniture are separate costs again.

Having children is not itself a screening criterion. Screening looks at the contract holder's income against the rent, the employer and length of employment, and the guarantor company's own decision. What does matter is the occupancy limit written into each listing, because some rooms are approved for two or three people only. Tell us the number and ages of your children first and we will leave out the listings you would be rejected on.

Yes. Tell us your target move-in date first and we will only show listings available then. Public school districts in Japan are decided by your street address, so if you need a specific school we can restrict the search to that area. January to March is when family listings move fastest, so starting two to three months before your target date gives you noticeably more choice.

About two to three months before your move-in date. Family-sized 2LDK and 3LDK listings are fewer than single rooms and the better ones go first, so it is worth starting slightly earlier than the one to two months we suggest for a single room. Earlier than four months is too early, because Japanese rentals are usually taken within one or two weeks of being listed, so nothing you see now will still be available. You can send us questions and estimates to review at any point before that.

Yes. Tell us about pets, a parking space, a delivery box or anything else while we are narrowing the list. Note that pet-friendly listings usually add one month to the deposit, and parking is charged monthly on top of the rent. Those are set by the landlord and sit outside the ¥0 agency fee, but we include them in the estimate from the start so you can compare the real total.

Yes. Viewings are attended by the managing company, so coming with children is normal and nothing changes. Kurabeel works without an office visit: the consultation, booking the viewing and the estimate all happen in LINE chat, in English. If viewings are hard to schedule, we can narrow the list down to three to five rooms in chat first so you only travel to those.