How much were your upfront costs? Like for your apartment, furniture, vehicle (if you needed one), etc? Also, had you saved up much beforehand? Do you wish you had saved more? Or were you fine with just a little?
by Formal_Green_831
How much were your upfront costs? Like for your apartment, furniture, vehicle (if you needed one), etc? Also, had you saved up much beforehand? Do you wish you had saved more? Or were you fine with just a little?
by Formal_Green_831
28 comments
I’m in Tokyo so it’s not the norm, but I brought around 800,000 yen with me to tide me over until the first paycheck. Which is a safe amount if you don’t want to live in an empty room for the first few months.
I was lucky and had about zero upfront cost aside from paying for utility setups and buying new bed sheets. I inherited good stuff from my pred, including an old bicycle. You can either luck out and need about 30,000 yen to get by or 200,000 – 300,000 yen and need a car plus other goodies.
Placed in inaka in cheap teacher housing with furniture left over from previous jets. I don’t think I needed more than 75000 yen and I probably could have gotten away with even less.
I ended up paying about £1500. I needed to buy almost everything in my apartment…. including all kitchen goods (minus the fridge and gas hob), something to sleep on, including linens (I bought a mattress and sheets etc from Nitori. I bought a bedbase at a later date). Plus many other expenses. I was in the inaka.
Medium sized town, outskirts of Tokyo. I needed ¥220’000 immediately at the real estate office. Afterwords, I had a completely empty apartment and needed to furnish it.
I probably spent close to $10k(CAD) getting everything set up.
First month rent: 33,540, Apartment deposit: 60,000, Car: 250,000, Furniture: 40,000ish (more than half of that was a mattress tho)
Total: ¥383,540/$2,553USD
There were probably some other small expenses I’m forgetting but those were the major ones
I had about 90,000 yen to my name when I showed up in 2004. That bought me a bed and other necessities with some left over when I got my first paycheck.
¥300,000 up front costs to secure my apartment and everything in Tokyo (4 year old, 25sqm 1K in Itabashi.)
I had “saved” up beforehand by selling most of my belongings and car. I think I brought over ~¥600,000
I brought 4k USD and I used about 2500 of it to furnish a 1k apartment and get set up with everything else. I live in Southern Ishikawa
first day here in my town, i had to pay around 205,000 yen for my unfurnished apartment. that includes the 2 months rent, key money, deposit and fees. Then i had to furnish everything, like it was literally empty with nothing, no appliances, not even lights and blinds. That was an interesting 1-2 months. I had brought 5000 dollars and it was useful since i needed to pay for basically everything and wasnt getting paid until a month later. My advice, bring more than you think you will need. i live in western Ibaraki.
I think my upfront costs were about 5k CAD. I have savings in general so I wasn’t too worried. Being in Tokyo, the apartment was my biggest cost. For appliances I tried to get second hand for almost everything. Furniture is cheap from NITORI so I suggest you check them out.
I brought over £3500 ish in cash, (physical and in the bank), and spent the entire lot. I’m not in Tokyo, but my apartment was completely empty (even had to buy my own light fixtures..), so I paid a deposit and 2 months rent, on top of £1000 to furnish the whole thing. I also still don’t have a car, so that’s going to be another big fork out. Could have easily been £5000 for the first 2 months, though obviously I got paid during that time.
I’d expect to bring £4000 or more though to ensure you have absolutely no issues honestly.
I brought ¥200,000/1300usd/8000ttd because my predecessor left dishes and bed frame and my BOE gives us appliances (stove, washer, fridge etc). I am in a small city in Hokkaido, and I didn’t have to pay key money etc. Most importantly, I got paid on the 21st August (got to Hokkaido on the 7th).
I also am generally not much of a spender (I’m very minimalist for lack of a better phrase), and I really only needed to buy a mattress, towels, a few household stuff like curtains, bath mats, food and travel around to sight see until the first pay day.
Now it’s close to winter, and I have to buy a lot of stuff for my home and myself. So the money I initially saved while everyone else was spending, I’m using it now. 😂
was placed in a suburban town with a pretty much fully furnished apartment, only had to pay my half of the rent (25.000 Yen), groceries and some smaller things. I think the first month I needed under 100.000 Yen. But I bought more stuff (new and nicer furniture etc) over the next few months/ year.
$8000 USD (house, car, stuff)
I took £2000 (at the time 320K yen-ish) and spent everything, even when I had 0 rent and 0 car cost as I was given a moped by the Board of Education.
Depending on your placement, rent might be free (unlikely but mine was), subsidised, or full price. If you’re placed in Tokyo which is the max I’d have about 140K yen prepared for 2 months of rent. However if you have find your own apartment, which I think is the case for Tokyo jets and maybe some others. You have to pay a very long list of upfront costs, i.e. Key Money, Deposit, a ‘Thank you for letting me live here’ deposit that you don’t get back, and some insurances. Some listings don’t require some of the deposits though.
Then you need a full months of basic groceries including oils/carbs/seasonings, I’d have 60K prepared for this.
Furniture and kitchenware can be bought along the way, but for a basic set up around 100K would cut it. (invest in a good mattress if you plan on staying). If you get a truly empty apartment you might need another 80K for a home appliance set (fridge/microwave/washing machine/etc.).
If you need a car, its going to be the case that you’re not in a city, so rent will be cheaper and its more likely to be subsidised. You can probably just include that in the difference in rent.
Definitely bring money to include having fun, you want to be out making friends with other JETs so you don’t feel completely isolated, the worst thing would be worrying about money, around 60K would be good. (more if you plan on being out a lot).
These are all very rough numbers, but yeah, I would recommend you aim for 400K+ outside of Tokyo, 600K+ in Tokyo, any you don’t use will only be an added bonus. Try look online and do a calculation of what you think you’ll need, then times that number by 1.3.
I moved into a basically unfurnished apartment.
First two months’ rent- 100k yen
Mandatory homeowner policy- 10k yen
Luggage forwarding fee from orientation- 3k yen
Lights- 12k yen
Fridge- 20k yen
Mini dishwasher- 35k yen
Mattress- 20k yen
Vacuum cleaner- 30k yen
Monitor- 10k yen
Air fryer- 3k yen
Rice cooker- 5k yen
Drawers- 10k yen
Got a table and chairs free from a departing ALT
Brought around 2k usd.
Startup was around 200 bucks if I remember correctly.
Had pretty much everything from all the preds over the years. Bunch of good stuff and bunch of junk.
I also got paid like 2 weeks later cuz I was a late arrival and BOE thought I needed money urgently for some reason?
Of course I got super lucky tbh
I arrived in August as part of the NZ cohort, I had a decent amount saved as I had heard Japan is super expensive and I didn’t want to be hit with any surprises! But! My startup costs weren’t very high as my pred had sold a lot of his stuff to me, and they were in really good condition!
I did have to buy a few things here and there but I took my own time in buying those as they weren’t super urgent! Also, the BOE set us up with our bank accounts the very next day and we were paid on August 20th – which definitely helped!
My rent is also subsidised which again worked out for the best!
It is hard to gauge on how much you would need to save, I would say if you save about $150-$200 / fortnight, it should set you up well 🙂
I didn’t have a predecessor but the BOE supplied a TV, futon, cooking basics, dining table with 3 chairs, washing machine, new tatami in one room and a coffee table. There was also a VCR which I very rarely used. My rent was subsidized and I was living in a large enough 2LDK. I didn’t need a car because public transport was convenient and I was a short walk from the supermarket and hardware store. For sheets and towels, I recommend Nitori.
So my main expenses were food and toiletries until my first paycheck. A phone, getting the internet set up. Getting my gaijin card (I think I had to do that). A lot of the basic things you can buy at Daiso, it’s like a dollar store or pound shop. I was on JET before there were smartphones, so now things are much easier for communication, shopping and traveling.
If you’re not bringing a laptop, I recommend that you buy one with a Japanese keyboard, but bring yours from home if you have one.
As others mentioned, bring more money than you need, but you should be fine with between $3,000 and $5,000. You should only need half of that but it’s not worth the stress if you need to find your own apartment.
In total, about 3-4 thousand USD
Apartment, 25,000 yen per month. No key money.
Empty, so I bought lots of items new, or used from other JETs.
2 brand new AC units: 140,000 yen (1,200 USD)
Mattress, bedding, office furniture: 70,000 yen (600 USD)
Used furniture from other ALTs: 10,000 yen (90 USD)
Phone. I used Mobal Japan. 4,500 yen per month (40 USD)
Internet: I used SoftBank (do not recommend). 4,200 per month, 15,000 yen construction costs.
Fun times
About £3,000
I had £5,000 saved so it was plenty on the end!
This included moving in costs (6 months worth of rent lol but luckily rent where I am is cheap) and I went all out to fully furnish my place right away (I moved into an empty apartment so furnished from scratch including washing machine and fridge 🙃)
Also included the first month of living in general before I got my first paycheck!
£2500 probably would have been enough but no less than that
Came with 200’000 Yen (about 1400$ in this economy) and was perfectly comfortable until my first paycheck, at which point you are self sustaining. You should be fine with 150’000, but 200k means you _really_ don’t have to worry.
I spent probably close to 2,000 USD and came with closer to 5,000 (back in 2017). I was very fine and glad to have my savings already started during the grace period of having to pay back my student loans
My only real upfront cost was my car. I spent ¥350,000 on it back in 2018, but by the time I left last year it was getting hard for people to find cars for under ¥500,000. My apartment was furnished down to the silverware, so there wasn’t anything (other than food) I really had to buy in the first month.
I think I’d saved up around $5,000 USD? Which back then would have been about ¥500,000. I didn’t even come close to using all of it it. Prices have gone up since then, but not that much
Around 500,000 yen (at the time it was USD 5,000 dollars ) probably 600,000. Didn’t really get on my feet till around 6 months in. Tokyo placement. But in total before my second paycheck (first went directly into the above total) it was 600,000 yen and I didn’t have enough for furniture and appliances tbh so I had to lease, and that was expensive and a waste of money in retrospect 🥹
It’s all really relative. I bought nothing in the two years I lived there. Just used old clapped out stuff that was in the house or being given away.
I bought a car for 250,000. Went well, drove it to the wreaker when I left.
Some people spend a bomb on setting up. I’d say your fine with USD$2k no matter what. Just might have to go without a car for a month or two if you have to pay key money
I never needed much for my apartment as I am a minimalist and was one of the few ALT’s who never needed a car either (I only had one school which was 5-10 mins by bicycle) so I probably got everything done with less than 150k yen.